Into the World

As part of their contracts, students in my English classes have to send at least one of their final revisions "into the world." The language in the contract is a little different from ENG 100 and 101 to ENG 102 because of 102's focus on literary genres, but the idea is the same: to think of the writing we do for class as being able to exist outside of the classroom, in the real world. This is a relatively new requirement, and I've asked students to let me know if they get responses from "the world."

Yesterday, a former student, Davianna O'Berry, shared a response with me and, with her permission, I'm including a snapshot of her twitter conversation with Erin Palmer. But first, a little background.

One of the short stories I assign for the semester is Lorrie Moore's "How to Become a Writer." The first writing assignment is a short character analysis with a twist -- students have to find some sort of personal connection to a character. So it's kind of a character analysis combined with a personal narrative.

Davianna related to Moore's depiction of uncertainty in college and beyond. She posted the essay to her class blog and found a relevant article online: "Why it's OK to be confused about your career," by Erin Palmer. She then shared her blog post with Erin Palmer, that article's author, via Twitter. While Davianna's essay may have a couple missteps and while the blog post may have a typo or two, I'm still excited that Davianna's ideas made it out of the four walls of our classroom and into the world.

Here's their Twitter conversation:

Why We Read and Write Poetry

Also on my personal blog. Since I keep hearing this on commercials, I thought I'd post a video of the original speech, from Dead Poets Society.

Crappy Notes

Out of context, these notes I put on the board are terrible. I almost feel sorry for my students.

Think Different

I posted this on my personal blog, but I wanted to post it here too. It's an Apple ad from 1997 (it's also in the movie Jobs). This is the real one, and it's for all the people -- especially students writing about the world -- who say things like "That's just the way it is" or "Things will never change." Maybe what we all need is a little more crazy!

Halloween Film Festival

There's a Halloween Film Festival today and students can submit scenes. I like to have a few ready, just for fun.

Trailer:

Scene:

Scene:

Death:

Poetry pre-brainstorm

I ask students to brainstorm some poetry terms/ideas before we discuss poems. Here's a list.

Dia de los Muertos

I walked past Ms. Finney's room and noticed the students doing something that looked like it might be interesting. So I stopped for a second and I was kindly invited in. The class was making skulls for Dia de los Muertos, which they'll later decorate. Looked like fun!