Writing Prompts

http://www.canteach.ca/elementary/prompts.html

Our Canadian friends always impress me with their resources for teaching. I wonder if Canadian schools ever left a child behind....
So, the opening link on this post is an awesome site for writing prompts--don't be put off by the elementary tag. These prompts will work for any age group.

The Teacher's Corner also has a good prompt site...
http://www.theteacherscorner.net/daily-writing-prompts/?gclid=CMLfoeXy8YwCFSgRGgodxXtODw

Then there is the Writer Digest's site...
http://www.writersdigest.com/writingprompts.asp

I Googled "writing prompts" and received 782,000 sites in .16 seconds, so do you really need me to talk about them here?

Consider Yourself Lucky with Poetry

Poet Geof Hewitt facilitated our session today, bringing an end to the fourth annual Rail City Writing Workshop at BFA in St. Albans. Geof knows how to connect with teenagers in a way that I admire and respect. He had them laughing, crying and performing their poems in a culminating poetry slam at the end of the day. If you get a chance to bring Geof to your school, do it: http://www.discover-writing.com/speakers.html His books are a terrific resource for any language arts teacher, K-12: http://www.amazon.com/Hewitts-Guide-Slam-Poetry-DVD/dp/1931492093 and http://www.ruralpoetry.org/site/c.jkIZLdMPJrE/b.1827301/k.ECD6/Resources.htm

In any of his workshops, Geof gets his students writing and writing fast. He is a believer in the seven-minute free-write, a strategy I use all the time. While this isn't anything new for teachers of writing--many thanks to Peter Elbow--Geof always reminds me about the effectiveness of free-writing. He sometimes gets kids to see it as a competition, to see who can write the longest entry, all in an effort to wave the brain good-bye and just write, crank it out.

One of the three prompts Geof used this morning was "Consider yourself lucky..." It worked well. Another was "Flying over my childhood home..." Some of the writing from these prompts was downright beautiful. What makes a good writing prompt? The one that gets the students to write, obviously. I know there are websites out there with collections of writing prompts, so we can all Google them at any time, but let's talk about prompts that really work. Having said that, we can't always rely on the prompt. We have to make free-writing a habit that kids don't question. We serve them by letting them see that they will throw away more than half of everything they write. Geof maintains that he uses only about five percent of writes in his journals. Let's get those young writers generating text, then we can worry about having them DRAFT THE ESSAY.

Looking for the National Writing Project's website? Here it is: http://www.writingproject.org/
You will find it to be one of your most helpful online resources.
The National Writing Project in Vermont website is right here, too: http://nwpvt.org/

Generating Feedback for Creative Writing

In our first two days of the fourth annual Rail City Writing Workshop, Philip Baruth had our students writing and rewriting their drafts of original short stories. He used three short stories as models, as well. What impressed me was the time he took to have all students read their drafts and then to generate feedback for each other. We need to give ourselves the permission to spend large blocks of time on this activity, to engage students in reading each other's work and to have them find what works and what is missing.

Professor Baruth insisted that students find a way to break through the linear plot line as a way to uncover more layers of the character.

Philip Baruth also is one of Vermont's most popular bloggers. Find him at http://vermontdailybriefing.com/

The Blogging Begins for this Middle-Aged Luddite

Dr. Paul Martin, professor of English and director of Canadian studies at UVM, arrived at BFA-St. Albans today to facilitate a workshop on blogging and online publishing. I am blessed to be working shoulder-to-shoulder with my beloved colleague, Ms. Polly Rico, who is significantly younger than I am and far more advanced in the use of this exciting new technology. I will be here, off and on, over the next few weeks or the next few years, writing about writing, the teaching of writing and the teaching of literature. Who knows what will happen?
I have resisted diving into the swamp of technology, but what do I have to lose?
I will be awaiting all the feedback and comments I receive from readers around the world.
Check Paul's blog at http://pwmartin.blog.uvm.edu/