On writing and mud pie

I am currently reading Richard Wright's Black Boy and came upon this passage yesterday on his philosophy of writing early in his career:

"My purpose was to capture a physical state or movement that carried a strong subjective impression, an accomplishment which seemed supremely worth struggling for. If I could fasten the mind of the reader upon words so firmly that he would forget words and be conscious only of his response, I felt that I would be in sight of knowing how to write narrative. I strove to master words, to make them disappear, to make them important by making them new, to make them melt into a rising spiral of emotional stimuli, each greater than the other, each feeding and reinforcing the other, and all ending in an emotional climax that would drench the reader with a sense of a new world. That was the single aim of my living."


Leaving Wright alone for a moment and considering the readings for this week, each author presents real-world activities for teaching voice and organization. While I generally find myself in agreement with Dornan et al., one of their proposals for the classroom left me scratching my head . . .They suggest, "projecting a paper on the overhead and inviting students on an 'error hunt' to produce an error-free final draft in Standard Edited English." Hmm . . .they also said that this activity would be "fun" and noted that students, "kept inching their moveable desks further and further forward to make sure they caught everything and engaged in some good-natured arguing about spelling." Really Dornan? Did that really happen? Where you able to captivate a middle school classroom with an projection of a paper and an erasable marker? Okay, okay, they continue with activities that I plan on adopting in the future.

The standout reading for me this week was Harper's "The Writer's Toolbox". I was excited to read about the "tools" she designed with her students so they would not only have a shared language, but concrete strategies to apply to their writing. Her methods break the writing process down into manageable structures that when applied breathes life into what is otherwise uninspired writing. Her Snapshots and Exploding a Moment ideas will make students excited about writing, reading and editing
. . .though probably not as much as an 'error hunt'.

For Wright, writing consumed his very being. His words ceased to be individual patterns of thought and became a powerful vehicle to convey understanding. How do we get our students there, where writing is not work, but a salve to be spread on the wounds of injustice, a tool for change, a window to the fundamental elements of their subjective realities? Culham, Harper and Dornan all have their theories on voice and organization, but until writing becomes a visceral enterprise, full of guts and passion, we are just putting frosting on mud pie.



My Link is to Paul Shambroom's website. Currently on display at the Weismann, Shambroom's work explores the dynamics of power in present day America. Some pretty chilling snapshots . . .

Multigenre writing

Gillespie’s article on multigenre responses to literature reinforces what I imagine will be an excellent resource for the classroom. Let’s face it, we will be working in an educational environment that has to compete with i-pods, IMs, i-friends and yes even cell phones (though David has a pragmatic solution to the latter). In this context, educators can choose to adhere to the antiquated FPT, or can open the door to student creativity. It boils down to our philosophies as educators. If we truly believe students are constructors of knowledge, then loosening our strangle-hold on rigid, formulaic organization will produce magnificently unanticipated results. Multigenre projects will be more difficult to grade(how do I grade a map anyway?), but Gillespies’ experience illustrates the importance of letting students direct their learning on an individual level.

Students constructing . . .
multigenre responses
have captured their minds

Does this mean that the five paragraph essay is completely irrelevant, or that explicit instruction on organization should be disregarded? The answer of course is a resounding "no". On both sides of the white board, the FTP works well. Students have an effective tool with which to organize thought, the teacher has a concrete method to teach and a rubric to grade objectively. The pitfall lies in students misunderstanding the uses of the FTP. In the classroom, this format should be used as a starting point with which to build from, not an absolute to be turned to at every opportunity. I agree with Wesley in that the teacher should be focusing on the fundamental structure of expository writing, the introduction, the body and the conclusion. The FTP is merely one variation of this structure.



Educator's Podcast Network From the site: The Education Podcast Network is an effort to bring together into one place, the wide range of podcast programming that may be helpful to teachers looking for content to teach with and about, and to explore issues of teaching and learning in the 21st century.

Writing Process

Seamus Heaney's writing room.

After reading about the writing process in the Dornan et. al selection, I was initially struck with how familiar it all sounded. In high school and college, my creative writing teachers employed what is more or less the "process" (prewriting, writing, post-writing etc.). It made a lot of sense then as it does now reading the passage. The main element missing in my experience, and one could surely argue that it is the most important, is the structured peer-review time. My high school teacher, Mr. Beckman would sooner have shaved his famously thick and bushy sideburns than let us actually converse about our writing. When the door closed, he was in charge, the sole possessor of good taste and style. However, he provided us with opportunities to prewrite in a number of ways, I actually remember doing the bubble exercise where we connected different concepts together for future writing exercises. We also learned a good deal of editing techniques. On the other hand, I realize how much I missed by not sharing my work with my peers and look forward to future classroom experiences where I can experience the strikes and gutters of writing with my students.

I really liked this article in the Guardian that featured writing rooms of famous writers. Be sure to check out Jonathan Safran Foer.