There are a lot of things that I love, but being told what to do is not one of them. At the beginning of the month we were asked by our principal to write a story by the end of the month. I thought, this is going to be easy, I love writing! I could probably even just take something from my blog or that I have already written and turn it in. But just like growing up, and being told in school that I had to read a certain book, it took all of the fun out of it. It went from being something I loved to do, to something that was an assignment. I have had writers block all month on what I am going to do. I could still just take the easy way out, but I really want to put together something meaningful. So here we are at the end of the month and my back is now up against a wall, which is when I work best, so we will see what happens. At least it got me on here writing again, finally.
In other writing news November is National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo in its shortened form. So hopefully I can overcome this writers block and just go crazy next month. So does anyone have any ideas what I should write about or what you do when you have writers block? Also have you had any teachers that have helped you be excited about writing? I sometimes forget what I didn't like as a student and I do the exact same thing to those I teach. I understand there needs to be assignments, due dates and expectations, but how can we make it as realistic as possible and keep that natural excitement about sharing our lives and ideas? I feel like I am doing better at this this year than I ever had, but I am always looking to improve.
If I come up with anything good before Monday I will post it here. If not it means I just used the story I wrote to go along with our personal narrative that I used with my students the first month of school. I posted it on here earlier, you can check it out.
http://downrightdave.blogspot.com/2010/03/ghost-of-vacations-past.html
1 comment:
I am finding with the students I teach that if I don't seem to have a personal connection with the subject, they have a hard time connecting as well.
I think that the thing we forget as teachers is that we need to make everything we do mean something, or connect to something. It's easy to be the student who looks on assignment with disdain, but what we really wonder as students is: Why is this important to me? Why should I care? How will this worksheet, or this assignment help me now or in the future?
It's difficult to find homework that assesses the student's knowledge, and also helps them feel like the subject is relatable to them. Sometimes I don't understand why we are called teachers...we are more like "learning facilitators" who are still learning. haha!
Good luck with your story!!!
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