Philosophy on Teaching Writing (And Other Thoughts)

Writing is a process that, on a basic level, functions to name and communicate ideas. However, writing is also a process that fosters resilience, encourages self-reflection and evaluation and facilitates a form of self-therapy—no shrink required. Clearly, writing’s practical purpose is essential and benefits our communities and societies at large in exponential ways. However, the process, the healing, self-reflection, self-awareness and resilience gained from writing is where its true value resides. Therefore, as I reflect upon the larger goals I intend to reach as a future teacher of writing, I can’t help but feel the burden of responsibility of teaching such weighty and potentially life-changing content. Writing can, in best practice, be powerfully revolutionary. It will be my aim to communicate writing as a process, as a form of resilience, to encourage critical thinking and to instill confidence within my students by helping them develop their voice.

On these grounds, it is priority to first and foremost communicate writing as a process, rather than a means of production. In his article, “A Thousand Writers Writing”, Robert P. Yagelski says, “I had always assumed, like most English teachers I know, that writing should produce a text to be used for some explicit purpose--to keep a record, promote learning, communicate ideas or information, or demonstrate writing ability (as in the context of assessment). It was not until I attended the opening session of the National Writing Project’s annual conference in 2004 that I began to consider the experience of an act of writing as separate from--and as valuable as--the text produced as a result of that writing” (Yagelski, 2009). And from personal experience in my own writing, I concur. I have never written to publish, but instead have found tremendous value in writing to reflect, to analyze, to make sense of things, to dive deeper in understanding of myself. In accordance with this goal, I intend to implement several types of assignments in order to yield the benefits of such a writing process. These include an extended writing project, (identical in nature to the piece we worked on all semester for Professor Branch) that allows students to explore their capacities and abilities as a writer while simultaneously encouraging personal reflection and continuous revision. Students will be forced to not focus on the end goal, but on the daily task at hand, as little as it may be. 

Moreover, as students view writing more and more as a process, I hope they would grow in self-reflection, that they would begin to see that they can gain something more than the text itself from writing. Therefore, I intend to incorporate memoir-esque writing assignments that challenge students to reflect on their life’s experiences and the ways that they have been shaped because of them, as well as daily writing prompts with questions that guide students into deeper, perhaps more introspective thinking. 

Finally, still in regard to writing as a process, I hope to strengthen my students’ revisional competency.  Mark Farrington, author of “Four Principles Toward Teaching the Craft of Revision”, says this, “Whether it be pride, a grade, or publication, revision is hard work, and everyone needs a reason to do it. Sometimes that reason might be practice. Teaching revision sometimes means practicing the technique of revision. Exercises like, ‘Write the beginning of your story from a different point of view, just to see if you can do it’ or ‘find a place other than the first sentence where this essay might begin, ‘ are valuable because they show student writers the possibilities that exist in writing” (Farrington). In this way, revision functions to challenge students to expand their thinking, to step outside of their comfort zone in writing.

Another major goal that I want to drive my philosophy in teaching is to promote writing as a form of resilience. As stated before, I will incorporate daily writing prompts that foster self-evaluation and reflection. However, I also hope to guide my students to harness their experiences and see the value in them as they work to create the individuality, strengths and unique passions within my students. I want to expose my students to writing’s therapeutic qualities so that later, when they are faced with struggles and setbacks, they are able to recall how writing can help them see their situation from various perspectives and can serve as a means to overcome their struggles or transform their thinking.

Additionally, I want to encourage writing as a means for critical thinking. I want my students to see the importance of engaging with the relevant political and social issues of our time and to challenge them to form their own opinions and standpoints. More than that, however, I hope to equip them with the ability to communicate those opinions in an effective and appropriate way. This, of course, can only come with practice. Ergo, I hope to regularly address the goings-on within our community and country and ask my students to respond to these events in the form of writing--something that could easily be incorporated into a daily writing prompt. 

Finally, as a teacher and mentor, I hope to instill confidence within my students--as writers, of course, but of greater importance, as individuals as well. I want my students to value their own individuality, their own strengths and weaknesses. Writing can do this for someone in a thousand little ways, but most dramatically as students begin to recognize and develop their own individual voice. I want to expose them to different types and styles of writing on a regular basis, to challenge them to experiment with their writing until they find a form that makes them come alive, to then make it their own. There is great value to this, beyond the beauty and art that can be produced from raw individuality. When a student finds their voice, who can begin to imagine what great things can happen?

In conclusion, I hope for my classroom to be a safe space, a place of exploration, vulnerability, imagination, healing, inspiration and growth--void of limitations or prejudices. Yes, this is a romantic idea--certainly difficult to create and perhaps impossible to actually attain and maintain. But, a teacher must keep this ideal in sight if progress of any valuable, lasting form is to be fostered within the confines of a classroom. Perspective is a lovely thing to hold onto--vision, a beacon of hope and promise for change. 

Reflections on Assignment Writing

1. My writers for this assignment entered into a space of vulnerability in their writing that they weren't particularly expecting. The prompt asked them to reflect on the spaces, physical spaces, they have occupied in their lives and recall an event from the perspective of the space itself. My writers seriously contemplated and reflected on their lives and the settings of their most prominent and significant life events, and their writing evolved from there. This prompt, and the work it produced, very accurately reflected my goals as a teacher of writing in that it took the writers to spaces they weren't anticipating at the start of writing, and thus allowed them to explore more of themselves and reflect on what is really important to them. I think it was a prompt that allowed space for growth, not only as a writer, but as a person as well if the writer allowed themselves to go there. I learned that this assignment does, indeed, have the potential to reach possibly touchy and emotionally charged places within my students. Considering this, I think I would definitely need to consider my audience, if they are capable of the maturity and emotional stability writing a piece like this requires, or consider alternative writing options. It is not, and will never be, my desire that my students feel uncomfortable with the level of vulnerability expected of them. I want to give my students choice to explore vulnerable places, to stretch themselves, but with such personal content, I never want a student to feel forced into those places. Therefore, I may consider altering the wording so that a student does not have to recall and reconstruct memories that cause negative or uncontrolled emotional reactions if they are not ready to be recalled and reconstructed.

2. Based on the extremely personal accounts that I received back from my writers, I decided that it was appropriate, and even necessary, to write each writer with personalized feedback that focused not on any particular grammar mistakes or the structure of their piece, but that focused instead on the process they were going through in their writing and the acknowledgment of their bravery and courage in writing their memories on paper. I learned that this piece should be purposed to focus on the process of writing, rather than the product--and maybe even that the product is altogether separate from what we would normally consider the "product" in writing--not just a final piece, but a process of growth for the writer as an individual. I wanted my feedback to encourage the process. I didn't care so much about what the finished product looked like, if it was publishing-worthy or not. I did care, however, about the state of my writers, about their courage in writing down memories hard to recall, about where they found themselves and what they learned about themselves after they were through. Feedback changes in regard to the purpose of the assignment, therefore my feedback became uniquely personal to each writer.

3. I was intrigued by the platforms of the writers who assigned assignments to me. Their platforms were heavily founded in big concepts like grief and core beliefs and values. I think I learned that it is important to write these things down, regardless of how much of a grasp you believe yourself to have on them. I learned so much about myself and my own ideas, things that were completely new to me though I had held these beliefs and ideas for quite some time before. As a future teacher, it causes me to reflect on the topics and issues I consider most important so that I can guide my students to write on these ideas, and thus solidify their own core beliefs and values. I didn't personally love everything I wrote, however the process led me to gain more clarity and insight into the values that ground every other belief and frame of mind I have. Had I had more time, perhaps I could have created a piece that I absolutely loved, however, the ideas I communicated were exactly what I hoped for.