She states, "Sometimes I published a story or poem in a class magazine, or brought a finished draft to the group for their response, or showed them a piece of my writing that had been professionally published. I did these things with one agenda in mind: to play the role of writer for their benefit and to try to lend adult credibility to the act of writing. I performed writing" (331).
I can honestly say that I never have had a teacher from k-12 show me their personal writing. I have never even seen a teacher have writing published (until I got to college). I feel that the simple act of showing her writing enables Atwell's writing lessons to become much more purposeful. She shows her students her writing is not perfect. She shows her students adults do write. And most importantly, she is a role model her students can look up to.
Whenever Atwell has a few minutes to herself, she writes. Rather than take advantage of the extra time she has for herself while at school, she writes. My teachers all took this time to get papers graded, so they would not have to bring them home. Atwell is simply selfless in the fact that she does everything in her power to help her students succeed. I want to be just like her when I have my own classroom.
Marissa,
ReplyDeleteI know what your saying about how teachers rarely make the extra effort to make writing into something more than just an assignment they have to finish over the weekend. I can't remember any of my teachers bringing in their works either. Not too long ago my girlfriend suggested that I become friends on Facebook with a teacher she had back in high school so that I could message him for ideas and advice when necessary. I looked over his page and saw that he has tons of his own original works that he read on camera and posts to his FB page for students to view. He has some really intersting poetry pieces on his page. I think that teachers like him and Atwell really are doing a great job of making writing something that is more interesting than most people believe it to be. I digress. Anyways, I liked your post.
-Sam