One of the shifts I have made in my work life that has been the best choice ever is to begin my work day by simply being a writer and a human. Sometimes life intervenes and it is not possible, but more days than not when I sit down at my desk in the morning I am opening my journal, a Google doc, or blog post to write, reflect, or revise. Just as I begin each of my classes with a simple writing prompt intended to orient all the writers in the room into their writing selves I need to constantly remind myself that writing brings me joy and helps me center and ground in the maelstrom of life. It is so easy to get sucked into the strong currents of work and life, but I find when I am not able to begin my day as a writer then my whole day is off. The best days, the perfect days, are typically when I can begin and end with a pen in hand. Once the heat of summer settles over Kentucky I love to end my day with a walk through the gloam at a local park and then writing about what bubbles up during that walk. One of the most important lessons taught to me by my mentor Nancy Peterson is to be the thing that you teach and bookending my days (and classes) with writing is one of the surest ways I know to live and teach writing.
A Writing Start
However, most of my students (and let’s be honest most writing teachers) are not in a season of life that allows for bookending their days with writing and reflection. The writing marathon is my secret weapon as a writing teacher and one of the surest methods I know to remind writers that they are writers. There is no replacement for spending most of our time together as writers engaged in the simple practice of writing and sharing and writing and sharing. There is no better way to help grow writers than to write.
The first thing I do with my students is to write with them. I write by hand in my journal and encourage them to put away their devices as well. We begin every class with a simple writing and sharing ritual that gets a lot of love in student reflections. In almost every class we find inspiration in the powerful messages and language offered by poets and write and share in response. Together we weave our stories into our notebooks and uncover messages we want to bottle up and deliver to the ocean. As we share these stories within our community we discover our stories, our ideas, our writing matters because it is both uniquely ours and intersects with the authentic stories of others. I do not assign writing. I invite writers to join me on a journey of discovery and that allows my students to engage in authentic writing.
I use the writing marathon approach to begin every unit and every class meeting with low-stakes writing, so by the time we begin to discuss the first draft of the unit deliverable students actually have that draft in the pages of their notebook. My favorite thing is to write and share with my students, but there is also a deep satisfaction to check in with students and witness their confidence unfolding as they take their next steps on their writing journeys.
Weaving Our Stories
I have always taught using a writing workshop method, but my work with Write Across America and student writers whose education has been shaped by the pandemic has honed my praxis into a marathon-style writing workshop. We warm up with a familiar writing ritual and close out with writing reflection. We write and share as a community of writers for multiple rounds throughout the class. I bring in outside voices to both inspire our writing and provide information to bolster our arguments then gradually encourage my students to locate their own supports, but my primary focus is on teaching my students to locate and trust their own voice, their own story. Our writing is the central focus of our class time and our work, but I stay true to my writing workshop roots by weaving in mini lessons when introducing mentor texts to the class and preparing students for each new stage of our writing journey. Students practice each new skill while we write together in class so the text already exists in their notebooks by the time they are ready to craft a This I Believe essay (or this version), a rhetorical analysis, or a formal argument. As a lifelong writer I believe in my core that our personal narratives play an essential role in every piece of writing we craft from job applications to grant proposals to sales pitches and that is why I believe the writing workshop is the only response to the rise of AI. Each writing teacher needs to find the writing workshop method that works for them and the National Writing Project stands ready to help with 50 years of teaching resources and a vibrant community of teacher leaders. And the National Writing Project’s Write Across America offers up writing marathons throughout the year! Are you ready to write beside me so together we can slay the AI monster?
Image by HeungSoon from Pixabay
