Posted by Jasmine H., Block 6Explanatory Note: The dialogue between writer and editor that makes up the bulk of this post is exactly the kind of dialogue that occurs routinely in the Language Arts Lab. There are students sometimes who complain that the teacher always tells them their answers are wrong and who elect not to speak out any further. The teacher maintains that by questioning and seeking more from students' answers he is taking them seriously, seeking to more fully explore and understand what they are saying and helping them learn to express it. It requires a great deal of trust on the part of a student, but it permits some lively and intense learning.
Mr. B separated us into groups and had those of us in creative writing read an essay he had written that summed up the main point he has been trying to teach us since school began. (See Choosing: The Way We Read and Write on the Resource Blog to read it yourself.) Then we were supposed to discuss whether an essay could be considered "creative writing".
[Editor's Note: So could it? How? What is this "creative writing" you speak of?]
And then we were to give our responses to the essay.
Some of us thought the vocabulary and fluidity of the essay were really interesting.
[Ed: What vocabulary? Why interesting? What is fluidity and can you show us examples from the essay? The opinions are only valuable to the extent that you can support them.]
Other quotes from the essay that we liked were:
"And what seems like weeks of energetic, earnest teaching and richly evocative learning experiences swirl down the Friday afternoon toilet bowl."
[Ed: Why did you like it? I suspect that it was just the fact that it mentioned swirling and the toilet bowl which are sort of titillating, borderline potty words. Am I right? I could have written (and thought about writing) "wash down the drain." Would that have been better or worse? Why?]
"...we give ourselves access to those unitended choices that are so rich an element of every artist's work."
[Ed: Out of its context, I'm not even sure I know what this is about, and I wrote it. I suspect that it says that by asking the question of choices, "we give..." That doesn't seem to be a reason to like this quote. Is it the word "access" or "rich"? Is it the generalization to every artist? Examples don't carry much weight without explanation.]
"The expectation, the goal, is to find the solution."
[Ed: I couldn't decide between "expectation" and "goal", so I used both. The sentence remains short anyway. Is that why you like it? Does it have some special place in its context? If you don't tell us why you like it, we can't learn much from your liking it.]
The choices he made when writing the essay make the essay creative.
[Ed.: Which choices? What do you mean by "creative"?]
The essay didn't follow any particular literary rules;
[Ed.: It did, too! Literary rule #1: Be concrete. Literary rule #2: Consider what will affect your audience when choosing what and how to write. Literary rule #3: Start with something
that will catch the reader's attention. Literary rule #4: A paragraph is not a certain number of sentences; it is a complete thought. What rules are you talking about? If it broke some, which ones? Literary rule #4: Break rules for effect. ]it just sounded like personal thought
[Ed. What are personal thoughts? What are the other kinds of thoughts?]
and almost blog-like which in turn resembled a more creative piece.
[Ed. Huh?]
We liked it!
[Ed. And I'm certainly glad you did, but without more concrete detail about what you liked and more explanation of why you liked it, it sounds like shallow flattery. I do love flattery, though, shallow or otherwise. And I hope you recognize what a really important contribution you have made by daring to put this out here and letting me turn it into a writing lesson. Thanks for being bold enough to write, especially on a day when your table group is only a part of the action.]
2 comments:
This blog entry didn't really catch my attension. It didn't really explain much.
This reminds me of being around Mr. B when he would try to convince me that I should read a particular book he liked. He was right in deciding I would like books by Robert Lawson, who wrote about a boy who shrank until he could ride a seagull in a special aircar designed and built by his father. I was fascinated by anything tiny and imagined myself traveling about in that aircar and seeing wonderful foriegn countries without being noticed myself, which would have been very comfortable to me years ago. I still enjoy tiny things (and The Fabulous Flight) but now prefer to imagine constructing an entire tiny community excavating and living inside a tree. Now I don't mind being noticed and see myself as the leader or most useful craftsman in that tree group rather than as a participant in someone else's fantasy.
On the other hand, there are still books he recommended that I have not yet read simply because HE recommended them. This is probably pettines on my part.
As some of you have wondered, Mr. B has been refining these ideas of his for a long time. It was not the sort of mealtime chatter that I found enjoyable at times. I usually withdrew and sat quietly. Now, I tell myself I would not retreat but present my ideas for consideration. As Jasmine H. has probably noticed, Mr. B can lay it on thick. But it is worthwhile to slog your way through his ideas and suggestions. When you finish, you will know more about what you think. Usually.
A song I liked from the 60s says, "Remember what the Doormouse said, 'Feed your head.'"
[Writer's Note: I liked that song for its minor key, the images from Alice in Wonderland, the discussion it invited on drug use, and the fact that I could understand the words.]
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