In the movie Finding Forrester, Sean
Connery’s character, William Forrester, shared his philosophy on writing with
Jamal Wallace, who was struggling to create an opening sentence, when he told
the young man, “First write from the heart, then from the head”. Those few paraphrased
words create, “Writing? Yes!” classrooms. When students write their first
drafts, be they for free writing, an assigned essay, or any time they wrestle
with extracting thoughts and ideas wedged like impacted wisdom teeth in the
crevices of their brains, they need to feel free to share their ideas without judgment.
Although the How Students Say It - word
choice, spelling, grammar, punctuation, and sentence structure - is seriously
important, it should be secondary to the What They Say.
Unless students feel confident expressing their thoughts, they will never reach
the point of understanding or caring about the importance of these skill
elements.
To become confident and willing writers, students
must consider writing as
- a way for them to show ownership of their thoughts, their ideas, and their own unique voices.
- a way for them to write from the heart.
- a way for them to believe in their thoughts and ideas.
- consider the proficiency benchmark as the means and the end to writing lessons.
- be told, “No that isn’t right,” because their thoughts differ from their teachers' interpretations.
- feel that finely-honed writing skills are more important than ideas.
- by explaining that every opportunity they have to express their thoughts and ideas in their pieces, they will learn what works and what doesn’t.
- by offered a plethora of choices as well as a choose-your-own-topic option for every analytic writing.
- by focusing their editing on three to four content and grammar areas only, not every single misplaced comma, misspelled word, etc.
- by answering questions about the piece length with words such as, “Write until you have fully developed your idea.” Note: a minimum length should be required, but never a maximum. Teachers may address students’ writing verbosity during conferences.
To create a love for writing, teachers should give
young people opportunities to write for fun as well as for analysis. When they
enjoy writing, students will increase their proficiency, thereby meeting
academic benchmarks. Students should
- create Madlibs.
- write scripts for favorite TV shows to act ou.
- pretend they are on ESPN and prepare, perform and record interviews or sports commentaries.
- create song lyrics and write in journals that they are confident will be read by their eyes only.
- combine drawing and painting with writing by creating storybooks that they share with neighborhood children or at local libraries during book reading times.
- respond to open-ended questions about their favorite television shows or movies to generate a discussion about plot, characters, filming techniques, and casting.
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| https://openclipart.org/for/teachers |
Why talk about a TV program? Because with every conversation,
young people are learning how to express their thoughts clearly. They will
remember this and use these same techniques when they have to write a critique
or an analysis of a literary piece.
This will ward off the Dreaded Literary Demons, too. When academic dialogs evolve from
engaging discussions where students and teachers reveal elements that intrigue
them or where they feel free to explain why the author’s words move them or how
they create word pictures, students will learn how to write with the same
passion and technical prowess that they use verbally. They will develop the
faith that they can proficiently identify and evaluate, in writing, examples of
themes, figurative language, or any other literary facet they may be asked to
explain.
To cultivate a love for writing, teachers should
not
- force students to discuss a topic for which they have virtually no feeling
- mandate students to format their thoughts into five paragraphs only
- order students to copy, “I will not…” sentences in their notebooks 500 times.
- require students to complete essay quizzes as a penalty for not participating in class discussions or not completing the reading assignments.
- expect students to face overly-edited papers that make them cringe instead of conjuring up an, “I can do this" attitude in their minds for the next writing mission.
- assign essays as a behavior modification technique
- allow the How Students Say It overpower the What They Say.
Young people must be given a multitude of
chances to write from the heart without worrying about being
told their ideas are wrong, their writing has no style, or their spelling is
atrocious.
Young people must be allowed to feel the flush
of excitement when they string plain words into Kodak moment word pictures.
Young people must be allowed to hold onto that
love for writing that they had when they were eight- years-old and the thoughts
bubbled from the word fountain in their souls so they can open the floodgates
to this very same passion when they are eighteen.
While you are generating your own summer Kodak
moments, some of which you just might turn into Twitter, Facebook or Instagram word
pictures, think about
- what turned you on to writing, as a student, instead of blowing your desire to write fuse
- why , as a teacher, you love grading some writing assignments and not others
- which engaging ideas that allow students to write from the heart before they their head steps in, you should add to your writing collection.
Then, when your classes resume, you and your
students will exclaim, “Writing? Yes!”
Happy Summer!
