Entry #2: My Experience as a Student of Writing

Interestingly enough, in the last two classes I have participated in through Regis, I have been asked to reflect on my experience as a student of writing. I have to admit, I found it quite odd.  Nobody had ever asked me to reflect on my experiences as a student; conversely, I was mostly asked to reflect on my practice as a teacher.  It was unchartered territory to analyze my literacy growth from the position of a young learner.  I can now see why the Regis instructors assigned this task.  In doing so, I have learned an extensive amount about how to teach writing...and how not to. 

You see, as a young student, my writing instruction was almost nonexistent.  I was merely given a topic, then told to write without any inspiration or instruction.  Later, when my paper was returned to me with copious red marks, corrections, and directives, I felt disheartened.  I also felt like an automaton.  As long as I fixed the things the teacher felt needed to be fixed, I would get a good grade.  I didn't have to think at all, just merely copy the teacher's carefully applied revisions and I was done!!  Then, as an older student, I was given templates with which to write detailed literary analyses and compose lengthy research papers.  Again, no instruction on how to use the template was given, nor was I guided on how to use other forms of writing (i.e. note-taking, outlining, paraphrasing) to begin to organize my thoughts as I prepared to write. 

Any quality instruction on writing was provided by my own experiences with books, by reading the work of published authors and thinking, "Ooo!  I love that sentence!  I'm trying to emulate that next time!"  By reading all the works of a particular author and recognizing his or her style, the craft and the syntax that made the text uniquely theirs.  By getting goosebumps after reading a sentence or paragraphy that moved me, and thinking I wanted to be able to do that too.  I realized, through my experience as a literature lover, that the best teacher of writing was writing itself, whether it be writing I enjoy from another author or by writing I compose as an inspired member of a literate community.  It is for that reason that I feel I am a competent writing teacher now:  I understand what inspires a writer, and I understand that burning urge to put pencil to paper and create.  I also understand the constriction and frustration experienced when given a prompt with which to write to...the very nature of writer's block, to me, is being blocked in by a narrow, uninteresting prompt.  And I understand the power of the red pencil; it's ability to either break a young writer's spirit or it's potential to be a teaching tool when coupled with thoughtful conversation with a more competent peer or teacher.

And I know my students feel the same way.  I know this because I have taught writing to students in both manners:  as a beginning teacher, the structured, yet uninstructional way in which I was taught; as a more seasoned teacher, the more literary, Writer's Workshop manner in which I wish I were taught.  When I teach using the Writer's Workshop pedagogy, I get amazing work from students; impassioned, imagery-rich prose and poetry that sometimes gives me chills.   I get groans of disappointment when I tell my class it is time to end our writing session for the day.  I get inspiration to write my own pieces from the work they share.  I see writers.