As I gear up for student teaching, I’m trying to get my writing skills back. If I hope to teach English, I had better be a living example for what a reader and writer looks like. Work for college education classes is one thing, but being a person who takes part in the world of reading and writing is another.
My outlet of choice is Fine Lines, a literary journal that was founded by Omaha Central High English teacher David Martin. It’s been around since 1991, and David edits the publication with great care and thought. It’s online at finelines.org. I’ve been helping a little with reading submissions, and now I’ve submitted a couple of short essays.
Writing for publication is authentic learning, and it’s something I’m thinking about for my future students. Seeing your name in print got me hooked a long, long time ago. And while today’s print might be real or virtual, I think it’s still a kind of catnip for kids who enjoy playing around with words.
The roots of SQ3R/SQ4R/SQRQCQ begin with SQ3R and the book Effective Study by Francis Pleasant Robinson, a professor of psychology at Ohio State University. According to an article on the website remembereveything.org, “(d)uring World War II, droves of army personnel were sent to colleges and universities to attend intensive training in skills relevant to winning the war. Robinson headed the Learning and Study Skills program at OSU, and based on his research devised the SQ3R method and other techniques to help military personnel to learn specialized skills in as little time as possible.” As our textbook describes, SQ3R is a “systematic way of studying text to support the student’s reading by previewing, skimming, and setting purpose questions before actual reading.” SQ3R is an acronym for the five steps of the method. Those steps:
Survey – Students skim their reading for charts, headings, etc.
Question – Students take the headings, charts, or other skimmed information and form basic questions.
Read – After creating questions, students then read the assigned text and seek answers to their questions.
Recite – This phase is where students answer questions and make notes.
Review – In this final step, students re-read to seek out information to any unanswered questions.
Even with the relative simplicity of the SQ3R approach, our text notes that it remains underutilized despite being “intended to echo the behavior of effective readers.” The following are all beginning resources on SQ3R. The resources:
The video “SQR3 Reading Method” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0dhcSP_Myjg) is one that a teacher could show a class as a way to introduce SQ3R. It’s embedded below after this first set of bullet points.
SQ4R adds the term “reflect” into the SQ3R method. A student would reflect (think about connections to what they already know) after the reading step but before the recite step, according to our textbook. It is worth noting that the fourth “R” in SQ4R can vary. Depending on the source, R can stand for “Record,” “Respond,” “Retell,” or “wRite.” The placement of the fourth R can vary, as well, meaning reflecting could take place as the last step instead of the fourth. No matter the particular word connected to R or the step order, the larger idea is that students should take extra time in the process to further think about the text they are reading. The following are SQ4R resources:
This video, “SQ4R: Strategic Reading,” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DbMlIPgqXB8) is a little homespun and defines SQ4R as survey, question, read, recite, record, and review, but it also shows the process of scanning, skimming, and questioning as a reader looks over a text chapter.
Whether a teacher is using either SQ3R or SQ4R, our text stresses that students need to understand that the methods are ones to be used and applied broadly. Learning SQ3R or 4R as a simple one- or two-day lesson sells these powerful study methods short. These skills can be applied in any course and to any textbook that needs to be read and comprehended.
SQRQCQ
An interesting derivative of SQ3R is one that focuses on helping students understand and work through math story problems. The SQRQCQ method, as outlined in our textbook, includes:
Survey – The reader skims the main idea of the story problem.
Question – The reader then asks the question that is stated in the problem.
Re-read – Next, the reader identifies the information and details provided.
Question – The second question has the reader ask what operation needs to be performed.
Compute – At this point, solving the problem is attempted.
Question – In the final step, the reader asks if their answer seems correct.
Using this kind of framework for story problems can help a student in identifying the important parts of the question being posed in an organized way. Like SQ3R and SQ4R, having this kind of system to use can serve as a powerful tool. Some SQRQCQ resources include:
The original article where SQRQCQ is mentioned dates back to 1965 and was authored by Leslie Fay. The citation is: Fay, L. (1965). Reading study skills: Math and science. In J. A. Figural (Ed.), Reading and inquiry (pp. 93–94). Newark, DE: International Reading Association.
I feel fortunate to be making a presentation about Quick Writes because I see myself using them in the future. I hope to be a secondary language arts educator. More specifically, I’d like to teach high school English.
I have some background with Quick Writes from both my course work and observing middle school and high school classes. The first time I heard the term was in a young adult literature course taught by Dr. Elisabeth Ellington (her blog is the Dirigible Plum) more than a year ago, and I thought it was interesting. My interest expanded last summer when I took a class on the teaching of writing and rhetoric from Dr. Brandon Miller. The texts I read in their classes that focused on the reasons and techniques of Quick Writing were written by Penny Kittle, a nationally-known high school educator who focuses on literacy, and education and writing scholar Peter Elbow. Both from out textbook and from my other readings, the reason Quick Writes are so compelling include:
Flexibility. As our text points out, Quick Writes can be used at the beginning, middle, or end of a class period. During my observations last fall, I thought “bell work” Quick Write activities were especially compelling. Instead of taking time settling down and getting oriented, I saw students immediately check for their bell work writing assignment from a screen at the front of their class, get out laptops, and begin short writing assignments. The topics then became launching points for the day’s lessons.
Novelty. Because, ideally, Quick Writes are brief, frequent, and low stakes kinds of assignments, teachers can have students attempt a wide range of writing. Our text provides an example of how a short essay evolved into a poem. Teachers I observed had their middle schoolers try writing personal narratives, short opinion pieces based on current events, poems, and more. Most inventively, one assignment involved students trying to imitate the writing style of authors they were familiar with.
Brevity. Investing two to five to 10 minutes does not make or break a class period. And, when done frequently, teachers can experiment and find out what kinds of writing works and doesn’t work with students.
Low, low stakes. I mentioned low stakes briefly already, but the point is worth expanding. Peter Elbow writes in his book Everyone Can Write: Essays Toward a Hopeful Theory of Writing and Teaching that “(i)f writing is an act of giving in, it seems to me that one of the most practical goals for us as teachers is to help students fall in love with their own ideas and their writing.” In the same book he also provides this nugget of common sense – “People don’t improve their writing much unless they do a great deal of it— much more than we can ever read and respond to.” Quick Writes can provide a frequent, possibly daily, means of students of getting writing exercise and getting over the fear of writing, which is often seen by students as intimidating and high takes.
In addition to the points I have outlined is a last idea that I think is important. I was lucky enough to have teachers and classmates say that my early writing (grade school) was good or funny or interesting. Those experiences were things that told me my ideas were worth expressing and sharing. I certainly did not know it at the time, but I entered a marketplace of idea . . . writing got me in the door. Quick Writes, with their focus on ideas and expression first and grammar correctness later, can allow more students into that space. The hard work of spelling and grammar are both important, but initial ideas are important, too. A focus on the structure and correctness often teaches young people that they are not, and are likely never going to be, writers. Teachers unintentional shut student ideas down and make students insecure in their writing.
Penny Kittle
Penny Kittle, in Write Beside Them, provides readers with the three rules of Quick Writes that she follows in her classroom. They are:
Write the entire time because stamina is important to writing.
Write quickly without letting the critic in your head censor you. She like the idea of writing “with velocity” to prevent the idea of becoming “blocked.”
Finally, she state relax, have fun, play.
These few lines from Kittle are especially important – “Quick writing is play with words. There is not enough play in high school . . . . Playful writing leads to a comfortable voice that is easy to read. Too often writing assignments in high school ask for a voice the student struggles to find. . . . In quick writes we seek the writer’s confident voice. We quick write—we practice—we discover. My students need to write every day, and expect to write every day, so they can begin to write with the same ease they speak.”
Peter Elbow
With all of the above in mind, traditional writing assignments and writing conventions, of course, remain important. Elbow, a great advocate for low-stakes and no-stakes writing assignments, does not advocate for the abandonment of high stakes writing. It’s just that Quick Writes provide an avenue to practice. This analogy is one I think explains it well A senior year term paper is a championship baseball game for a student writer. Getting prepared for that game involves practice. Quick Writes are like playing catch or taking swings in a batting cage. The repetitions are all experiences which help teach what does and does not work. There is value in that. Works Cited Elbow, Peter. Everyone Can Write: Essays Toward a Hopeful Theory of Writing and Teaching Writing. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. E-book. Kittle, Penny. Write Beside Them. Portsmouth: Heinemann, 2008. Print.
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Resources for Quick Writes
The following resources provide a kind of starter kit for information about and how to use Quick Writes in the classroom. There is a wealth of articles, videos, and more on the topic online. For simplicity, the resources below are broken up into explanations of what Quick Writes are, tools that teachers can use, and additional information.
Short explanations of Quick Writes
“Quick Writes” (http://ablconnect.harvard.edu/quick-write) – This short online document from Harvard.edu has a great list of references and other resources. Beyond English/Language Arts, a line from the article’s first paragraph states the Quick Writes “ . . . can be used in a broader range of disciplines.”
“Quick Write Resources” from the School District of Schiocton, Wisconsin (http://www.shiocton.k12.wi.us/staff/quick_writes.cfm) — Educators are sharing people. This web page provides several downloadable (in Word) documents. The include 40 Descriptive Prompts, 45 Narrative Prompts, 60 Persuasive Prompts, 75 Expository Prompts, and Daily Writing Prompts.
“Quick Write Rubric” (http://teacherweb.com/PA/MaterDei/MissWaltrich/Quick-Write-Rubric.pdf) – For teachers who want and need rubrics, well, there are rubrics for Quick Writes. From what I have read, the idea of creating a formal standard to meet flies in the face of the logic (and freedom) that Quick Writes are supposed to provide.
“Six Ways to Use Quick Writes to Promote Learning” (http://oncourseworkshop.com/life-long-learning/six-ways-use-quick-writes-promote-learning/) — This online article actually is focused on using Quick Writes in the college classroom, but it is certainly applicable to younger learners. The six areas it lists in how to use Quick Writes include using them to promote personal connections, assess student knowledge, summarize reading, promote reflection, encourage critical thinking, and to make predictions/inferences/hypotheses.
Quick Writes are part of three PDF planning handouts from www.pennykittle.net — The hotlinks provided will download unit template guiding questions for narrative, expository, and argument writing units. The sections on Quick Writes are similar.
List as many names of people important in the Civil War as you can in thirty seconds
Write down one question you have about our federal budget
Define in your own words what a democracy is
List two things that changed after the Brown v. The Board of Education ruling
“Teaching To Kill a Mockingbird” (http://teachingtokillamockingbird.com/ideas-for-teaching-to-kill-a-mockingbird/) — This lesson plan web page includes a mention of how to use a Quick Write in teaching this classic novel. It reads “Select a key line from that day ‘s reading and use it as a prompt (or as the first line) of a quick write. As students write, give them other words from the chapter to incorporate in their writing.
The three children did not say a word. They sat quietly in the boxcar, looking at the bushes, waiting for more undead ghouls.
“I wonder if it’s a bear,” thought Benny. “It’d be great if it was just a regular bear. Not a zombie bear.”
Soon something came out. But it wasn’t a bear. It was a dog, which hopped along on three legs, crying softly and holding up a front paw.
“It’s all right,” said Jessie. “It’s only a dog, but I think he is hurt.”
The dog looked up and saw the children, and then he wagged his tail.
“Poor dog,” said Jessie. “Are you lost? Come over here and let me look at your paw.”
The dog hopped over to the boxcar, and the children got out.
Jessie looked at the paw and said, “Oh, dear! You poor dog! There is a big thorn in your foot! But at least nothing has bitten you to make you among the undead.”
The dog stopped crying and looked at Jessie.
“Good dog,” said Jessie. “I can help you, but maybe it will hurt.”
The dog looked up at Jessie and wagged his tail again.
“Violet,” ordered Jessie, “please wet my handkerchief in the brook.”
Jessie sat down on the bloody tree stump and took the dog in her lap. She patted him and gave him a little piece of bread. Then she began to pull out the thorn. It was a long thorn, but the dog did not make any noise. Jessie pulled and pulled, and at last the thorn came out.
Violet had a wet handkerchief ready. Jessie put it around the dog’s paw, and he looked up at her and wagged his tail a little.
“He wants to say ‘Thank you,’ Jessie!” cried violet. “He is a good dog not to cry.”
“Yes, he is,” agreed Jessie. “Now I had better hold him for awhile so that he will lie down and rest his leg.”
“We can surprise Henry,” remarked Benny. “Now we have a dog.”
“So we can,” said Jessie. “But that was not my surprise. I was going to get a lot of blueberries for supper.”
“Can’t we look for blueberries, while you hold the dog?” asked Violet.
“Yes, you can,” said Jessie. “Look over there by the big trees.”
Benny and Violet ran over to look.
“Oh, Jessie!” cried Benny. “Did you ever see so many blueberries? I guess five blueberries! No, I guess ten blueberries!”
Jessie laughed, “I guess there are more than five or ten, Benny,” she said. “Get a clean towel and pick them into it.”
For awhile Jessie watched Benny and Violet picking blueberries. Standing watch like this did not bother her.
“Most of Benny’s blueberries are going into his mouth,” she thought with a laugh. “But maybe that’s just as well. He won’t get so hungry waiting for Henry to come back with the milk.”
She carried the dog over to the children and sat down beside them, the dog on her lap. With her help the towel was soon full of blueberries.
“I wish we had some dishes,” Jessie said. “The we could have blue berries and milk.”
“Never mind,” said Violet. “When Henry comes, we can eat some blueberries and then take a drink of milk.”
When Henry came, he had some heavy bundles. He had four bottles of milk in a bag, a loaf of brown bread, and also some fine yellow cheese.
He looked at the dog.
“Where did you get that fine dog?” he cried. Again, Henry . . . not so smart.
“He came to us,” said Benny, “he is a surprise for you.”
Henry went over to the dog, who wagged his tail. Henry patted him and said, “He ought to be a good watchdog. Why is the handkerchief on his foot?”
“He had a big thorn in his foot,” answered Violet, “and Jessie took it out and put on the handkerchief. It hurt him, but he did not cry or growl.”
“His name is Watch,” remarked Benny.
“Oh, is it?” asked Jessie, laughing. “Watch is a good name for a watchdog.”
“Did you bring some milk?” asked Benny, looking hungrily at the bottles.
“I should say I did!” replied Henry. “Four bottles!”
“Pool old Benny!” said Jessie “We’ll have dinner now. Or is it supper?”
“It must be supper,” said Henry, “for soon we’ll have to go to bed.”
“Tomorrow we’ll eat three times,” said Jessie.
Now Jessie liked to have things in order, and so she put the laundry bag on some pine needs for a tablecloth. Then she cut the loaf of brown bread into five big pieces. The cheese was cut into four.
“Blueberries,” cried Henry. “Jessie, you had two surprises for me!”
“I’m sorry we haven’t any cups,” Jessie said. “We’ll have to drink out of the bottles. Now all come and sit down.”
Supper began, “Look, Benny,” said Henry. “You take some blueberries, then eat some brown bread, then some cheese, then take a drink of milk.”
“It’s good,” said Benny. He began to put more blueberries into his mouth.
“The dog had supper, too. Jessie gave him bread as he lay on the ground beside her, and he drank milk out of her hand.
When supper was over, there was some milk left in each bottle.
“We’ll have the rest of the milk for breakfast,” said Jessie. “Tonight we are going to sleep on beds. “Let’s get some pine needles now.”
Soon the children had a big pile. Henry jumped into the boxcar, and Jessie gave him the pine needles. He made four beds in one end of the car.
“This side is the bedroom,” said Jessie.
“What will the other side be?” asked Benny.
“The other side?” asked Jessie. “Let me think. I guess that will be the sitting room, and maybe some of the time it will be the kitchen. And when we have to shut the door to keep the zombies out we will think of this as a fort. I still can’t believe there are many of them nearby.”
“I polished off those two, no waiting,” chirped Violet.
“Yes,” Jessie sad. “Yes, you did.”
The Jessie said, “Come, now. Come and get washed. She took the cake of soap and went down to the brook.
“That will be fun, Benny,” said Violet. “We’ll splash our ‘paws’ in the brook just as the Little Brown bear does.” She knew that Benny did not like to be washed.
The children were all very hot, and so they were glad to splash in the cold water. Benny put cold water and soap on his face with the others and dried his hands on a towel.
“We’ll have to have a line to dry the towels on,” said Jessie. “We could trip zombies with a rope, too.”
“So she took the string out of the laundry bag and tied one end of it to a tree. The other end of the strong she tied to the boxcar. This made a good clothesline. When she had washed one towel and Violet had washed the other one, they hung both towels on the clothesline.
“It looks like home,” said Henry. There’s had been a shabby home. “See the washing!” He laughed a not very bright laugh.
Jessie was thinking.
“We ought to get some water to drink before we go to bed,” she said. “But what shall we put it in?
“Let’s put all the milk into two bottles,” said Henry in a small flash of smarts. “Then we can fill the other two with water.”
“Good,” said Jessie. “You go alone to the fountain, Henry. You can hide if anyone or anything comes along.”
Henry went out very quietly, and soon came back with two bottles full of cold water. Benny drank a little, but he was almost asleep.
The other children helped him into the boxcar. Then they all climbed in, Jessie carrying the dog. He lay down at once beside her.
Soon they were fast asleep, dog and all. The moon came up, but they did not see it. This was the first time in four days that they could go to sleep at night, as living children should.
At last Jessie opened her eyes. It was morning, but the sun was covered by clouds. The color of the sky was like a giant bruise. She sat up and looked all around her. It seemed like night because it was so, so dark. Suddenly it began to thunder, and she saw that it was really going to rain.
“PSM V47 D661 Fracto nimbus advance clouds of a thunderstorm” by Unknown. Hover on photo for details.
“What shall we do? Where shall we go?” thought Jessie.
The wind was blowing more and more clouds across the sky, and the lightning was very near.
She walked a little way into the wood, looking for a place to go out of the rain.
“Where shall we go?” she thought again.
Then she saw something ahead of her in the woods. It was an old boxcar.
“What a good house that will be in the rain!” she thought.
She ran over to the boxcar. There was no engine, and the track was old and rusty. It was covered with grass and bushes because it had not been used for a long time.
“It is a boxcar,” Jessie said. “We can get into it and stay until it stops raining.”
She ran back as fast as she could to the other children. The sky was black, and the wind was blowing very hard.
“Hurry! Hurry!” cried Jessie. “I have found a good and safe place! Hurry as fast as you can!”
Henry took Benny’s hand, and they all ran through the woods after Jessie. Violet trailed the group to make sure nothing followed them.
“We’ll soon be there,” Jessie shouted back. “It is not far. When we get there, you must help me open the door. It is heavy.”
The stump of a big tree stood under the door of the boxcar. There looked to be blood on it. It bothered the children none at all. They had seen more blood than that for free with their breakfast cereal. Jessie and Henry jumped up on the old stump and rolled back the heavy door of the car. Henry looked in. No one looked to be home.
“There is nothing in here,” he said. “Come, Benny. We’ll help you up.”
Violet popped in next, and, last of all, Jessie and Henry climbed in.
They were just in time. How the wind did blow! They rolled the door shut, and then it really began to rain. Oh, how it did rain! It just rained and rained.
Violet looked through the slats of the boxcar’s side. Her eyes grew wide.
“Look!” she said. “Look . . . the undead!”
Two zombies were stumbling toward the boxcar. One might have been a farmer at one time. He wore ragged overalls. The other might have been a businessman. He still wore a tie.
“What will we do? What will we do?” cried Jessie.
“We will stay quiet and stay in here and see what happens,” said Henry. They all crouched low.
At there very moment, a crack of lightning and thunder loudly burst over there heads. It made the children jump a bit and Benny shrieked until Violet popped a hand over his mouth.
The lightning made the zombies look straight up. And they continued to look straight up. They looked straight up into the pouring rain for five, then ten, then fifteen minutes. At seventeen minutes they both fell over. Even in the pounding rain, they could be heard gurgling.
“They are water logged!” Henry cried. “They can’t drown, but they are too heavy from drinking in the pouring rain! Stupid zombies!”
Before anyone could say more, Violet had pushed open the boxcar door and found a railroad spike in the mud. Thirty seconds later, the undead had been made completely dead by a 10-year-old girl. After her assault, Violet stood in the rain to wash the gore off her clothes.
The other children remained in the boxcar with their mouths open. Violet returned.
“What a good place this is!” Violet said. “This boxcar is just like a warm little house with one room.”
After awhile the rain and lightning and thunder stopped, and the wind did not blow so hard. Then Henry opened the door and looked out. Yep, the two zombies were now permanently out of commission, he thought. All the children looked out into woods. The sun was shining, but some water still fell from the trees. In front of the boxcar was a pretty little brook ran out the rocks, with a waterfall in it.
After Henry and Jessie dragged the now very dead farmer and businessman deeper into the woods to rot, the children all gathered near the boxcar.
“What a beautiful place!” said Violet. “And if they come in ones and twos at a time, I can take them!
“Henry,” cried Jessie. “Let’s live here!”
“Live here?” asked Henry. He was a pretty boy, but a little slow.
“Yes! Why not?” said Jessie. “This boxcar is a fine little house. It is dry and warm in the rain.”
“We could wash in the brook,” said Violet.
“Please, Henry,” said Jessie. “We could have the nicest little home here, and we could find some dishes, and make four beds and a table, and maybe chairs.”
“No,” said Benny. “I don’t want to live here, Jessie.”
“Oh, dear, why not, Benny?” asked Jessie.
“I’m afraid the engine will come and take us away,” answered Benny.
Henry and Jessie laughed. “Oh, no, Benny,” said Henry. “The engine will never take this car away. It is an old, old, car, and grass and bushes are growing all over the track.”
“Then doesn’t the engine use this track anymore?” asked Benny. “There must be a few train engineers left in the world.”
“They don’t use the track anymore. I don’t know about the engineers,” said Henry. He was beginning to want to live in the boxcar, too. “We’ll stay here today, anyway.”
“Then can I have my dinner here?” asked Benny.
“Yes, you shall have dinner now,” said Henry.
So Jessie took out the last loaf of bread and cut it into four pieces, but it was very dry. Benny ate the bread, but soon began to cry.
“I want some milk, too, Jessie,” he begged.
“He ought to have milk,” said Henry. “I’ll go to the next town and get some.”
But Henry did not want to start. He looked to see how much money he had. Then he stood thinking.
At last he said, “I don’t want to leave you girls alone.”
“Oh,” said Jessie, “We’ll be all right, Henry. We’ll have a surprise for you when you come back. You just wait and see!”
“Good-by, Henry,” said Benny.
So Henry walked off through the woods.
When he had gone, Jessie said, “Now, children, what do you think we are going to do? What do you think I saw over in the wood? I saw some blueberries!”
“Oh, oh!” cried Benny. “I know what blueberries are. Can we have blueberries and milk, Jessie?
“Yes,” Jessie was beginning. But she suddenly stopped, for she heard a noise. Crack, crack, crack! Something was in the woods.
Soon the children left the town and came to a road. An, oh so quiet road. The big yellow moon was out, and, mercifully, they could see everything very well.
“We must walk fast,” said Henry. “I hope the baker and his wife don’t wake up and find us gone.”
As they had before, they walked down the road as fast, and as quietly, as they could.
“How far can you carry Benny?” asked Violet.
“Oh, I can carry him a long way,” replied Henry. He hid his fear well. He never wanted to be confronted with the choice of dropping his little brother for self-preservation versus being consumed. It haunted him when he slept. If he slept.
But Jessie said, “I think we could go faster if we woke him up now. We could take his hands and help him along.”
Henry stopped and put Benny down.
“Come, Benny,” he said. “You must wake up and walk now. And I mean walk. Not stumble or canter or amble like those who should be in the grave.”
“Go away!” said Benny.
“Let me try,” said Violet. “Now, Benny you can play that you are a little brown bear. Not an undead bear, but a real, live bear. And you are running away to find a nice warm bed. Henry and Jessie will help you, and we’ll find a bed.”
Benny like being a little, living brown bear, and so he woke up and opened his eyes. Henry and Jessie took his hands, and they went on again.
They passed some farmhouses. Hard to tell if they had been overrun or not. They were all dark and quiet. The children did not see anyone or anything. They walked for a long time. Then the red sun came up.
“We must find a safe place to sleep,” said Jessie. “I am so tired.”
Little Benny was asleep, and Henry was carrying him again. The other children began to look for a safe place.
At last Violet said, “Look over there.” She was pointing to a big haystack in a field near what looked to be an un-assaulted farmhouse.
“A fine place, Violet,” said Henry. “See what a big haystack it is!”
They ran across the field toward the farmhouse. They jumped over a brook, and then they came to the haystack. Henry was still carrying Benny.
Jessie began to make a nest in the haystack for Benny, and when they put him into it, he went to sleep again at once. The other children also made nests.
“Good night!” said Henry, laughing.
“It is ‘Good morning,’ I should think,” replied Jessie. “We sleep in the day, and we walk all night. Kind of like the undead! When it is night again, we’ll wake up and walk some more. I worry about what’s out there in the night, but oh, well!”
The children were so tired that they went right to sleep. They slept all day, and it was night again when they woke up.
Benny said at once, “Oh, Jessie, I’m hungry. I want something to eat.”
“Good old Benny,” said Henry. “We’ll have supper.”
Jessie took out a loaf of bread and cut it into four pieces. It was soon gone.
“I want some water,” begged Benny.
“Not now,” said Henry. “You may have some water when it gets dark. There is a pump near the farmhouse. But if we have the haystack now, someone – or some thing – will see us. Do you want to be gnawed on?”
When it was dark, the children came out of the haystack and went quietly toward the farmhouse, which was dark and still. Nearby was a pump, and Henry pumped water as quietly as he could. He did not even wake up the hens and chickens.
“I want a cup,” said Benny.
“No, Benny,” whispered Henry. “You will have to put your mouth right in the water. You can play you are a horse.”
This pleased Benny. Henry pumped and pumped, and at last Benny had all the water he wanted. The water was cold and sweet, and all the children drank.
Then they ran across the field toward the road.
“If we hear anyone, living or dead,” said Jessie, “we must hide behind the bushes.”
Just as she said this, the children heard a horse and cart coming up the road. It was driven by a zombie couple. The horse also looked dazed. He had a bleeding bite mark on his flank.
“Keep very still, Benny!” whispered Henry. “Don’t say a word. And we need to stay downwind.”
The children got behind the bushes as fast as they could, for they did not have much time to hide. It was good that the undead move slow, even when riding in a cart. The horse – neigh/moaning softly – came nearer and nearer and began to walk up the hill toward them. The children could hear a man talking. This was a new zombie. It was the baker! Or rather, the late baker!
“Children . . . gone. Hungry,” murmured the baker. “No far. Children no far . . . Seek them . . . find them . . . seek . . .”
“MMMmMmmm . . .,” answered his now zombified wife. “No like children . . . like brains. Seek . . . seek.”
The children watched until the horse and cart had gone down he road. Then they came out from behind the bushes and looked at each other.
“My, I am glad those people did not see us!” said Henry. “You were a good boy, Benny, to keep still.”
Violet thought silently that she could have saved them from becoming the undead if only she had slit the throats of the baker and his wife when she had the chance. Too late now, she thought. Now, she thought, I’ll need a shotgun.
“I wonder how far it is to the next town,” said Jessie. “I think that’s Silver City.”
The children were very happy as they walked along the road. They knew the zombie baker and his zombie wife were not going to find them. They walked until two o’clock in the morning, and then they came to some signs by the sides of the road.
The moon came out from behind the clouds, and Henry could read the signs.
“One says that Greenfield is this way,” he said. “The other signs points to Silver City. We don’t want to go to Greenfield. I think it’s been hit by the plague harder than most. Let’s take this other road to Silver City.”
They walked for a long time, but they did not see anyone.
“Not many people are left out here, I guess,” said Henry. “And once they’re gone, well, there’s nothing left to feed the zombies. But that is all the better.”
“Listen!” said Benny suddenly. “ I hear something.”
Violet dropped to the ground, felt it for vibrations and hissed “Listen!”
The children stood still and listened, and they could hear water running.
“I want a drink of water, Henry!” said Benny.
“Well, let’s go on,” said Henry, “and see where the water is. I’d like a drink, too.”
Soon the children saw a drinking fountain by the side of the road.
“Oh, what a fine fountain this is!” said Henry, running toward it. “See the place for people to drink up high, and a place in the middle for horses, and one for dogs down below.”
All the children drank some water. Jessie mentioned that this would not be a place where zombies come to. Zombies don’t need water.
“They don’t even need milk or multivitamins, either,” she added. “They’d be easy to get along with if they just didn’t eat people.”
“Now I want to go to bed,” said Benny.
Jessie laughed. “You can go to bed very soon.”
Henry was looking down a little side road, which had grass growing in the middle of it. It looked undisturbed.
“Come!” he cried. “This road goes into the wood. We can sleep in the woods as long as we keep on the lookout.”
“This is a good place,” said Jessie, as they walked along. “It is far away from anyone living or dead. You can tell that by the grass in the road.”
“And it will be near the drinking fountain,” said Violet, who was thinking strategically.
“That’s right!” cried Henry. “You think of everything, Violet.”
“It is almost morning,” remarked Jessie. “And how hot it is!”
“I’m glad it is hot,” said Henry, “for we must sleep on the ground. Let’s find some pine needles for beds.”
The children went into the woods and soon made four beds of pine needles.
“I hope it’s not going to rain,” said Jessie, as she lay down.
Then she looked up at the sky.
“It looks like rain, for the moon has gone behind the clouds.”
She shut her eyes and did not open them again for a long time. She was so, so tired of it all. So freaking tired of it all.
More clouds rolled across the sky, and the wind began to blow. There was lightning, also, and thunder, but the children did not hear it. They were all fast asleep.
One warm night four children stood in front of a bakery. No one knew them. No one, no thing, was yet pursuing them. No one knew where they had come from.
The baker’s wife saw them first, as they stood looking in at the window of her store. No one yet knew what was ahead. And all was quiet and unafraid. At least for now.
The little boy was looking at the cakes, the big boy was looking at the loaves of bread, and the two girls were looking at the cookies.
Now the baker’s wife did not like the children. But at least she was among the living. She did not like the boys at all. So she came to the front of the bakery and listened, looking very cross.
“The cake is good, Jessie,” the little boy said. He was about five years old.
“Yes, Benny,” said the big girl, who was more than a little world weary. “But bread is better for you. It helps keep you fast. Isn’t that true, Henry?”
“Oh, yes,” said Henry. “Bread makes you strong and fast. We must have some bread, and cake is not good for Benny and Violet.”
“I like bread best, anyway,” said Violet. She was about ten years old, and she had pretty brown hair and brown eyes. She was stealthy.
“That is just like you, Violet,” said Henry, smiling at her. The smile was also tired, a little forced. So much was just a matter of moments before whatever would come next. Days seemed like weeks to Henry, but what was a living person to do . . . even at this age? “Let’s go into the bakery. Maybe they will let us stay here for the night.”
The baker’s wife looked at them as they came in. The children looked good and alive, even in the twilight.
“I want three loaves of bread, please,” said Jessie.
She smiled politely at the woman, but the woman did not smile. She looked at Henry as he put his hand in his pocket for the money. He had no pistol. She looked cross, but she sold him the bread. She had no firearm, either.
Jessie was looking around, too, and she saw a long red bench under each window of the bakery. The benches had flat red pillows on them.
“Will you let us stay here for the night?” Jessie asked. “We are not among the undead, and we could sleep on those benches, and tomorrow we would help you wash the dishes and do things for you.”
Now the woman liked this. She did not like to wash dishes almost as much as she disliked things that went bump in the night. She would like to have a big boy to help her with her work. And she could push one of them into the yard if necessary.
“Where are you father and mother?” she asked. She already knew the answer.
“They are dead . . . or undead,” said Henry.
“We have grandfather in Greenfield, but we don’t like him,” said Benny.
Jessie put her hand over the little boy’s mouth before he could say more.
“Oh, Benny, keep still!” she said.
“Why don’t you like your grandfather?” asked the woman.
“He is our father’s father, and he didn’t like out mother. And this was before the long plague,” said Henry. “So we don’t think he would like us. He doesn’t even know we are among the living. He may be among the undead, anyway. We are afraid, in any case that he would be mean to us.”
“Did you ever see him?” asked the woman. “He may still be among those that still breathe, the real.”
“No,” answered Henry. “And being alive doesn’t mean love. Or even liking someone.”
“You’re silly, child. Why do you think he would be mean to you?” asked the woman.
“Well, he never came to see us,” said Henry. “He doesn’t like us at all. And now . . . well, now . . . “
“Where did you live before you came here?” asked the woman.
But not one of the four children would tell her. And there was no sound in the distance. No shuffling, no moaning. Nothing.
“We’ll get along all right,” Jessie said. “We want to stay here for only one night.”
“You may stay here tonight,” said the woman at last. “And tomorrow we’ll see what we can do.”
Henry thanked her politely. He did not trust her. He trusted so very, very few.
“We are all pretty tired and hungry,” he said. “But hungry in the appropriate and living human way.”
The children sat down on the floor. Henry cut one of the loaves of bread into four pieces with his knife, and the children began to eat.
She went into the next room and shut the door. The children heard her set one, two, three heavy locks.
“I’m glad she is gone,” remarked Benny, eating. “She doesn’t like us.”
“Sh, Benny!” said Jessie. “She is good to let us sleep here.”
After supper the children lay down on their red benches, and Violet and Benny soon went to sleep.
But Jessie and Henry, who always slept with an ear and eye open, could hear the woman talking to the baker.
She said, “I’ll keep the three older children. They can help me. But the little boy, that little piece of veal, he must go. He is too little I cannot take care of him.”
The baker answered, “Very well. Tomorrow I’ll take the little boy out into the woods. It won’t take long. We’ll keep the others for awhile, but we must make them tell us who their grandfather is.”
Jessie and Henry waited until the baker and his wife had gone to bed. Then the sat up in the dark.
“Oh, Henry!” whispered Jessie. “Let’s run away from here!”
“Yes, indeed,” said Henry. “We’ll never let Benny become a snack for the creatures in the woods. Never, never! We must be far away by morning, or these living people will find us. But we must not leave any of our things here.”
Jessie sat still, thinking. She contemplated the treachery of people. She would mark this, remember this. It would grow in her gut over time. Such rage in someone so young.
“Our clothes and a cake of soap and towels are in the big laundry bag,” she said. “Violet has her little workbag. And we have two loaves of bread left. Have you your knife and the money?”
“Yes,” said Henry. “I have almost four dollars.”
“You must carry Benny,” said Jessie. “He will cry if we wake him up. But I’ll wake Violet.”
“Sh, Violet! Come! We are going to run away again. If we don’t run away, the baker will take Benny out to . . . to . . .to . . . it’s too horrible to think about.”
The little girl woke at once, and she understood. She sat up and rolled off the bench. Like a ninja, she made no sound.
“What shall I do?” She whispered softly. “Is there someone, something that needs to be made silent?”
“Just carry this,” said Jessie. She gave her the workbag.
Jessie put the two loaves of bread into the laundry bad, and then she looked around the room.
“All right,” she said to Henry. “Take Benny now.”
Henry took Benny in his arms and carried him to the door of the bakery. Jessie took the laundry bag and opened the door very softly. She hoped nothing in the night could smell them. All the children went out quietly. They did not say a word. Jessie shut the door, and then they all listened. Everything was very quiet. So the four children went down the street.
My last couple class blog posts have talked about experience, where I’ve come from. They looked backward. This post is a bit different. The most important thing I did while working on the unit plan was to get outside of my head a bit and have conversations on what would and wouldn’t work in a classroom with a real teacher. That teacher is, of course, my wife. This post will also cover important aspects of the unit plan, too, but I very much wanted to write about what this final section of the class especially taught me – when you’re a teacher you can’t go it alone. And who would want to?
Christine has been interested in analyzing advertising as a way to get at rhetorical analysis for some time. She teaches AP language arts at her high school here in Omaha. She gets class after class ready for the Advanced Placement exam every year. She also serves as an AP reader (and has spent a week in Lexington, Kentucky in early summer the past two years reviewing hundreds of papers.) She has opinions on what will and won’t work for students working on getting a paper together.
The nut of her interest in how advertising analysis can lead to more is a very cool, but brief, video “Learning to Think: A Foundation for Analysis” by teacher Sarah Wessling. This video, along with several nights of conversation while our daughters were outside playing, helped flesh out the unit plan. I bought into the idea very quickly.
In getting lesson plans or unit plans together for my previous CSC classes, my basic method has been hunt around on the net or other resource and try and find something that more-or-less fits. Modify a little here; add something there . . . and things fall together. Well, at least for the purpose of getting an assignment done.
What I have not done much of, however, is talk about education goals with a partner or bounce ideas off of someone. And I’ve certainly never spoken at length about a unit plan with a classroom teacher. Yes, I’ve talked about classes and assignments with my wife, but it was mostly skimming. My classes on tech in the classroom, HR issues, special education stuff are distant from her practical teaching world. She did listen to me swear a lot while I slogged my way through a methods class last Spring semester.
I know online classes, by their nature, are for lone wolf types (and I’m one of them) but it does get quiet, even lonely, sometimes. The feedback from my professors on what I have put together during the past year has been positive, but I inevitably wonder about the real world and real students. Christine became my check and balance.
When I was talking about my unit plan assignment weeks ago, my wife practically jumped and said she had just the thing to think about and work through. It was an eye-opener and satisfying to have a planning discussion.
I’ve always thought of teachers in terms of planning alone. It’s their classroom, their plans, their students. I know that’s not completely true, but that aspect of being on your own is attractive, at least to me. What took me a bit by surprise was that talking through what you want to do in a class, and what you want to accomplish as far as learning, was a heck of a lot of fun to talk about with a (future) colleague.
Some of the issues we discussed included:
Using just print ads instead of adding in TV commercials. Christine agreed with me that video is too distracting to have good conversations over. And are you going to just play a TV commercial once or put it on a loop? Print is simple, clean. It can be seen without being distracting. (The commercial below is arguably the best Super Bowl commercial ever.)
The worth of low-stakes assignments; using rubrics; what a graphic organizer is versus a traditional worksheet.
The importance of showing students what an excellent assignment looks like. My wife remains a believer in also showing examples from previous years that are middling and poor. While I took those types of example out of the unit plan after class feedback, Christine sees worth in showing and telling students that “if your assignment reads like this, well, you can expect . . ..” She has a point.
This point is a troubling one for me (and my wife.) Practically all of the writing assignments for my unit are completed in-class. Yes, that’s much more achievable using a block schedule, but that’s not the primary reason. My wife puts it simply — If you give students significant writing homework it won’t get done, and then (as a teacher) you’re stuck the next day trying to accommodate and trying to play catch up. She’s seen a significant shift in student willingness to do homework. Teachers, rather than students, have made adjustments.
Finally, a significant part of the plan we talked about was her experiences using anonymous peer feedback. Like I wrote about in the preface to my final unit plan, in her classes she rarely experiences problems with students being mean or snarky with their anonymous comments. I know my wife wouldn’t describe her class as a writing community, but she would say that, in general, she has good kids who aren’t mean and who can be thoughtful when giving feedback. They just don’t like homework.
As a future teacher, my goal (my hope) has been to get hired at a good school and to make an educational contribution that makes a difference. Talking with my wife on a professional level has helped underscore for me that teachers can and should consult with each other in meaningful ways. An individual can only go so far figuring out what is and isn’t important (even with a good set of books and resources) in education. I’ve embraced some interesting ideas from both ancient Rome and modern America as far as teaching philosophy goes, but putting those thoughts into practice is going to take both me gaining experience and learning from the experience of others.
Is my unit plan perfect? Not even close. What I do know is that plan is not one that was copied off the net or dreamed up by an education student who has no experience. I talked, reviewed, talked, edited, and talked more to work through things. And there’s value in that.
Christine with the final high school yearbook she oversaw from a few years back.
Every writer evolves. When a person sits down at a keyboard or picks up a pen and pad of paper they bring their life experiences with them. A high school English teacher can add to the experiences of his or her students by assigning great literature and providing (requiring) opportunities to write. While this approach sounds simple, getting young people to enjoy writing—and to help them see themselves as writers—has to be approached with planning, thoughtfulness, and faith.
Faith is a word I use with great care. One of the few things I have faith in is writing; another is education. My favorite teachers presented books, ideas, feedback, and advice that made a profound difference. It’s with them in mind, in addition to what I have been learning during my Chadron State Post-Bac studies, that I have tried to organize my thoughts on a theory writing instruction.
While taking Theory & Practice of Teaching Writing this summer, I have found myself attracted to an old, traditional educational approach that focuses on reading quality written works and writing and to a much newer, and inclusive, method of writing instruction and feedback. I see the connections between the two, and I find this old-new approach interesting.
Quintilian’s statue in Calahorra, La Rioja, Spain
My experience of learning to write was grounded in a Roman-style imitation method, although I didn’t know it. The practicality of having students read assigned written works and work on their writing in various ways and formats, as described by the orator Quintilian 2,000 years ago, has stood the test of time. I can’t imagine many English teachers arguing that having their students read good books and practice their writing by writing wouldn’t be beneficial. What Quintilian wrote about students and reading doesn’t sound dated to me at all. “For my part,” he wrote, “I would have them (students) read the best authors from the very beginning and never leave them, choosing those, however, who are simplest and most intelligible” (Bizzell and Herzberg 375).
In my case, my language arts and communication classes from junior high through college essentially followed a standard reading and writing approach. On top of enjoying literature, as a student I had the ability to look over different written formats (news stories, features, themes) and learned quickly from examples. A language arts teacher, I think, absolutely needs to supply models of excellent essays, short stories, term papers, etc. if they want students to produce their own versions of that work.
While I admire much of the imitation method, I do see that using it without thinking through ideas for differentiation and supportive assessment is likely to result in what is often seen in classrooms – students failing to learn and learning to think of themselves as failures with writing. While I learned and received good grades, I can’t say my experience was true for all (or even many) of my classmates. While critiques I received were mostly positive, I can understand how a teacher’s negative comments on a student paper can be damaging. Even during Roman times, the advice on giving feedback to young writers tended toward a light touch. “Nor is it improper of me to offer this admonition; that the power of boys sometimes sink under too great severity in correction; for they despond, and grieve, and at last hate their work, and, what is most prejudicial, while they fear every thing, they cease to attempt any thing,” wrote Quntilian in Book II, chapter four, section 10 of Institutio Oratoria (Bizzell and Herzberg 370).
Peter Elbow
Quintilian describes how students should be brought along in their education, starting first with simple lessons, but progressing over time. My newer educational touchstone has become writing educator and scholar Peter Elbow. I’d like to think that he and Quintilian would agree about the importance of having students start with what Elbow describes as “low-stakes” writing before attempting more involved “high-stakes” assignments.
While Quintilian offers some advice about being kind and supportive to students, Elbow states several times in his essay “High Stakes and Low Stake in Assigning and Responding to Writing” that an educator should “at least do no harm” when providing a comment on a student paper. While I have much to learn, I do think what Elbow writes about is also anchored in common sense.
I agree with Elbow, when he writes that writing for a class often feels like it’s important and “high stakes” for students (352). That high-stakes situation sets the stage for student stress and failure. Elbow is a proponent for lots of writing as a solution to get past that feeling of stage fright, but much of it can be “low-stakes” or non-evaluated writing assignments, journaling, etc. Getting students comfortable with putting ideas down on paper is the basic, important activity. Higher-stakes assignments with more formality (and likely more involved critique) will eventually enter the picture during a course. Low-stakes assignments will most often receive very little or no teacher comments.
“The goal of low-stakes assignments is not to produce excellent pieces of writing, but to get students to think, learn, and understand the course material,” Elbow writes (351).
But Elbow isn’t, and I’m not, saying that there shouldn’t be a place for high-stakes writing assignments. Higher stakes written pieces (longer essays, terms papers) become projects where there are multiple drafts and students get feedback from their teacher and often other students. In my mind, in the draft process a student is walking a paper forward with increased accuracy and focus thanks to supportive guidance. I very much agree with these lines from Elbow – “Assigning more writing, using less response, and using more praise doesn’t mean leaving out all criticism or lowering standards. Students need the experience of writing a great deal and getting minimal low-stakes responses because they tend to associate writing with criticism and high stakes” (357). Elbow finishes this thought with “(w)e are actively setting up powerful conditions for learning by getting students to do something they wouldn’t do without the force of our teaching” (357).
The educating “force” of my favorite teachers definitely existed. They set standards I wanted to meet, taught me things I didn’t know, and let me explore a bit with my writing. Looking at it now, I’m not sure how much was planned and how much was setting a stage for education to happen, but it worked. They also, like Quintilian and Elbow express in their books, cared about students. I mentioned faith in education and writing earlier, and I’ll add another item to my list. I also have faith that students, when provided with support and guidance, will prosper. I know not every student will fall in love with writing and books, and that is to be expected. But writing and books shouldn’t be seen as the enemy, as something that creates a feeling of failure.
My theory of writing instruction calls on me as an educator to provide great readings, ample opportunity to write in various ways, thoughtful feedback, and a classroom space that is supportive for learning writers and the writing process. A final point is that by demonstrating a high level of caring about the subject, about learning, and about the students I will hopefully be able to show how important writing can be to young people.
Works Cited
Elbow, Peter. Everyone Can Write: Essays Toward a Hopeful Theory of Writing and Teaching Writing. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. E-book.
Quintilian. “From Institutes of Oratory.” The Rhetorical Tradition: Readings from Classical Times to the Present. Eds. Patricia Bizzell and Bruce Herzberg. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2001. 359-428. PDF.
I have been writing and writing and writing in ways that have sought out attention and reward as long as I can remember. Early on, teachers and friends recognized that I had a talent with words. Whatever that initial ember of ability was, praise certainly helped fan it into what I have become. I am a person who has been defined by his ability to write.
I intentionally avoided using the term “writer” at the end of the previous paragraph. In an earlier online discussion, I explained a few of the titles that I’ve connected to myself over the years – “reporter” and “public relations flack” are the biggest. I would also include “freelancer” and “playwright.” Writer may capture all of that, but declaring yourself a “writer” just feels odd.
When I look back at my adult life, the writing I have done, for good or for bad, has been, I think, broad. When I try and place myself in the history of rhetoric, writing, and writing instruction, I can say I’m okay with, even a little proud of, the range of my work. It’s more than a little cliché to use Whitman’s line “I contain multitudes,” but it’s true. The results have varied widely, too. Writing has put money in my pocket, provided me a way to access people and places, given me an outlet to express myself, and more. There are times I think I have been wasting my ability, but writing has been patient with me. It’s always waiting . . . and I always end up picking up a pen or sitting at a keyboard.
Frog and Toad . . . an early favorite
My road to writing started, of course, with home and school. My parents, both English teachers, made sure my brother and I had mounds of books to read and my town built a public library down the street from our house when I was eight. Some kids go outside to play basketball all afternoon. I walked two minutes and spent hours in the stacks. At home, my parents were readers, and my father was a model of what spending time writing looked like. Every night, he was in his basement office pounding away at a typewriter (eventually a word processor and later still a computer.) Most of his writing went into our local school district’s newsletter and the state NSEA and national NEA magazines. He’s in his 80s now, and his eyesight is poor, but my dad still edits and writes the school district’s newsletter.
In high school, I ended up being recruited into journalism class with the promise that it was an easy A. During the first weeks, my teacher saw that I had ability, and I (happily) became the school newspaper workhorse for the next two years. That led to my undergrad major in journalism, which co-existed comfortably with college newspaper work and professional internships.
An Education by Imitatio
All of how I learned to be a newspaper guy during these years was by Imitatio – pure imitation. Journalism classes paled in comparison to an editor yelling at you. I learned how to cover news, edit copy, and write up committee or government meeting stories by looking at examples and trying. Don’t knock the idea of repetition, along with reading deeply, as an education method. Quintilian was dead-on right about Imitatio.
After college, I worked a little over three years as a reporter. The time was brief, but formative. Thanks to what I’ve picked up in this class, I now see reporting as a dialectic experience. Like the Sophists of Greece, reporters should look at the different sides of an issue and explore the questions involved. They should also remain aloof, neutral, and convey facts. I tried to follow that method and belief system, and reporting could be vastly interesting. It also wasn’t, and isn’t, fairly compensated for the effort.
Reporting did, however, sharpen my writing skills and lengthened my writing stamina. Enter public relations – which is certainly not dialectic or neutral, but does value the ability to string words together. (Here’s a link titled What is Public Relations? Read it with a grain of salt.)
Scribing for Dollars
For nearly 20 years, I served in various positions in health care and higher education public relations work. (Here’s a link to what I think was a high profile event in my career — President Karzai of Afghanistan came to my campus back in 2005.) A couple of weeks back in a paper, I connected how medieval scribes and PR flacks have more than a little in common, and it absolutely rings true. Public relations, in every sense, is about persuasion. The disconnect, at least for me, is in using your persuasive writing skills in the service of something or someone else. If you believe in what you are writing about, the work can be easier. If your company (your patron) asks you to write about something you are not connected to, or even dislike, using your skills to persuade can feel at least dishonest and, sometimes, loathsome.
There’s been some focus about writing being an expression of the self, the personal in our class discussions, and those points are reflected in the class readings on the modern era, particularly Peter Elbow. I don’t disagree with the importance of any of it, but I do have a different perspective about the business of communications. People and companies can and do hire people with writing ability. Those patrons (there’s that word again) are not paying for a writer’s personal thoughts or views. It’s all about bringing a skill into the service of a business or organization. And I believe this–if and when someone invents a press release generating program there will be a range of pr, marketing, and advertising writers who will be made utterly irrelevant. I’ll make you a bet that the function of today’s medieval scribes will be turned into software in my lifetime.
The PR mindset, writing for another, has helped make me a good freelance writer. This may be the purest form of the patron-scribe relationship. I prefer to think of it more like the Old West than the Middle Ages, though. I can write for just about anyone on anything if I view myself as a hired gun. Give me a topic, a deadline, a word count . . . and a check . . . and we have a deal. Since the relationship is impermanent, the disconnect between personal beliefs and writing for another, at least for me, is solved. The patron can rent my services and skills, but I am not owned.
Sometime Writers Receive Different Kinds of Compensation
This is the poster for my full-length play. The cast signed it.
If writing for pay sound a little dark, the years I spent writing for a community theater were all about being free. Free to write to explore ideas; free to find out what makes an audience laugh or shudder; free in the sense there was no money being exchanged. It helped balance out my public relations career.
If being a PR flack was serving in a medieval tradition, knocking out one-acts and a full-length play was my version of hanging out with Peter Elbow and the expressivists. The laughter and applause of an audience feels amazing. Creating for the stage was cathartic.
* *
This post has covered the four terms I mentioned at the start – reporter, pr flack, freelancer, and playwright. This assignment also mentions writing instruction. In that spirit, I’ll come clean. I have taught for brief periods twice in my life. One experience was deeply satisfying and successful; the other left me depressed.
The succees? I fell into a student director position with the National Collegiate Honors Council that sent me to Czechoslovakia for a semester with a group of 30 honor students back in 1992. In addition to serving as an RA, the organizers let me teach an experiential education course — City As Text. I assigned students relevant place-centered readings and then had them go out into the community to visit different places and events and (hopefully) meet people. The essays that came out of those experiences were always good, and sometimes stunning. Maybe it was time and place, but at 24 I thought that teaching might be the right fit.
But I didn’t go into teaching, I went into PR and got married and bought a house. After I earned my master’s, I tried teaching again at a community college. The class met for four hours on Saturdays, and I discovered that knowing how to write was no guarantee of being able to teach people about writing. I walked into a classroom with no advice or guidance on how to teach. The students who had ability coming into that basic English class (essentially how to write a college term paper) didn’t need much guidance. The students who needed help, however, needed much more than I could provide. I couldn’t simply show them—imitatio style—what to do. The textbook the class used, which seemed simple to me, was impenetrable to some. And time slipped by far too quickly. I taught one quarter.
Now in midlife, I know I want to effectively relate why literature and writing is important. The modern era readings that we are going through, the different theories and approaches to rhetoric and teaching writing, provide perspective for me. Honestly though, reading about Elbow and the others, at least so far, would not have helped me with that community college class.
I look at all of what I’ve been doing at CSC for the last year as building a foundation, and I’m enjoying this class and its focus. These are all things that feed me. I need to know and understand the big ideas of modern education, but at the same time I can’t wait to get to my classroom observation class and student teaching. At the end of the day, I want to circle back to imitatio. For me, that is the basic component of what writing and education is about. Let me build from there.
![Lars Curfs [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons](https://omahatim.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/quite_the_happy_dog.jpg)
![By cyclonebill from Copenhagen, Denmark (Ost og brød Uploaded by FAEP) [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons](https://omahatim.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/1024px-ost_og_brc3b8d_5115370158.jpg)
It was driven by a zombie couple. The horse also looked dazed. He had a bleeding bite mark on his flank.
The third degree . . . this time education 
