I think of myself as a writer of necessity. My career as a student has to led to more writing for assignments and grades than writing for myself. I usually have one or two writing assignments each week and I think that number is plenty. I want to do more writing for myself. I want to create a blog for myself. I have been thinking of what I would want to write about and how I would write about myself.
I am a list maker. I love lists. But more than just lists, I love to cross everything off my list and throw it away. I sometimes find myself adding things that I have done just so I can cross them off. I feel so accomplished when I finish a list. I am just like my mom in this way. She always had a list that she would add things. I have a feature on my cell phone called "memo." I always have at least eight memos. I delete and add to the memos constantly. I also use drawings to express my ideas or needs. This comes in handy at work. I plant decorative flowers pots for people. I keep a journal of every pot I plant each season. This journal includes both a drawing and a list of plants. It is great because people will come back the next season and want pots the same or like certain plants and not know what plant they want. I can refer back to my journal and give my customers exactly what they want. It has made my job a thousand times easier. Another type of writing I use every day is text messaging. I text my friends and family. It is so much easier than calling, especially when I just have a quick question or can't talk on the phone. I use my facebook account to update my friends and family on my life or funny things that happen. My little sister and I have conversations via facebook messages.
Usually the reason why I liked or disliked the writing assignment was directly related to the relevance or the relevance I felt the assignment had to the class or the topic. One assignment I remember disliking was a questionnaire for the book The Hiding Place. The questions were more related to the dates of each event, like what day were the ten Booms discovered? I didn't understand why the teacher was focusing on those facts when the bigger more important issues where being ignored. I hated that assignment. To this day I can't understand the point of that assignment.
I want to make writing a part of my classes in a way that is cohesive and makes sense to my students. I don't want my students to question the relevance of any assignment I give them. On the same note, I want to use differentiation as a part of my instruction. Every large assignment would be different and more tailored to each students needs and likes. I wish I would have had more opportunity as a student to pick how I would show my knowledge.
I love you first sentence "I am a writer of necessity." I am the same way, I also make to do lists constantly, text, and Facebook. I love that you design decorative flower pots and think that is a great way to keep track of each pot. I think that it would something that I could use with students in a floriculture class. I think that would give students an opportunity to write something that had application. Thanks for the great idea!
ReplyDeleteJournaling - one of the best things a human can do for themselves, those they interact with, and those that come after them. One of my methods teachers showed us how she wrote in a journal after every day teaching. Things that went tell, what to change/improve, what was done, etc. She had many reasons she gave us about why it was such a good idea to do that. But it makes it hard sometimes for all the things in our life that could make a good journal. Journaling for work seems so boring though sometimes, even when we know how much it will help us in the future!
ReplyDeleteI was so glad that Francisca wrote a comment on your blog because I was just about to recommend it to her and to Andy. That's a great use of writing--a very authentic use of writing--to organize your thoughts in florticulture.
ReplyDeleteI am totally a list-maker too. I don't like keeping digital lists, though--my grandmother gave me a "Reading Woman" calendar book that is very sentimental to me. I just like the aesthetics of writing in it. For me, it's both aesthetic writing and functional writing.
My last comment to you is that I loved your insight about The Hiding Place. That is such an applicable lesson to your work as a history teacher--instead of primarily asking factual questions, you can ask bigger theme, bigger picture questions to help students really engage in the issues that have driven the human experience over time.