Melinda

Dear Sharon,

That's very Optimistic of you. And kind.

But I am fully aware that I stayed away from the
pursuit on purpose. Being forced to write about
issues that didn't interest me made me not want to
write at all ... and eventually to come to avoid it
entirely.

I have addressed writing Specifically. But the same
statements could be applied to any course of study
that is coerced and involuntary. Golfing, knitting,
reading, cooking, ...

My G__, I imagine even Talking could become an
activity to loathe and run from if you were
"instructed" in how to do it "properly". And if
every time you opened your mouth some "expert" opined
on your every word.


I believe writing is as well learned as reading and
speaking are by example. By reading , being read to,
and developing a personal and positive relationship
with letters, sounds, words, literature and finally
putting it together as the individual feels
comfortable.

We don't sit our children down at the table on the day
they are born and begin instructing them on the rules
of language. They learn to speak by speaking and
being around those who speak well is the best teacher.

Walking is learned by doing it. By gradually
mastering the steps that lead to it. Not by reading
about them or being lectured on them. Having a hand
to hold every now and then works wonders. Being
talked at about what is the"correct" way to walk would
be as useless as instruction in most pursuits is.
Maybe knowledge of the activity would be advanced, but
the do-er still has to find her own way.

That is the perspective I was coming from.


Dear Sandra,

I hate that you seem to have taken this personally.
The examples you have listed below could apply just as
easily. If I spend time around an accomplished
calligrapher or read about it and am fascinated,
become interested , begin practicing the techniques
and ASK for instruction then that is the perfect time
for the accomplished one to offer it.

The same would be true for any art, music, dance,
etc......
(Brick laying or shoe selling for that matter.)

The harm is in the involuntary "educating". The
mandatory and proscribed "methods" used in teaching
tend to kill the joy and render the student
irrelevant.

That any writing could be viewed apart from its
content will never make sense to me. Maybe this is a
very personal view. But without the idea or
perspective coming across, it's just a waste of time
and paper. There are better uses for trees than that.
Writing is about Expression. Techniques and rules
can't stand alone.

I think that writing ought to be reserved for those
who have something to say. Reading and being read to
teach much about good writing and a willing listener
will pick it up.

Just as "late" readers tend to "make up" for YEARS
worth of non-reading, those who write when they have a
thought worthy of penning can quickly and easily
acquire the mechanical imperatives of good writing.

Most importantly to me, those who are not forced to
write when they have nothing to say will not be pushed
away from it out of desperation.

I know, as anyone else here does, that your approach
to learning is a very positive one. It is clear that
you gave your students as much freedom and latitude as
the system you were functioning in allowed.

It is the System that I find fault with, not those who
operate within it and attempt to maintain their
Integrity.

Any system that requires its participants to mirror
creativity with on-demand assignments is working
against itself.

Melinda




> Perhaps your creativity hasn't been ruined or even
> delayed. Perhaps it has only matured.
> Good Luck!!
> Sharon of the Swamp
> ion put me?
>
>
>
>
> Message: 8
> Date: Sun, 14 Jul 2002 16:33:03 EDT
> From: SandraDodd@...
> Subject: defense of teaching the mechanics of
> writing
>
>
> In a message dated 7/14/02 12:23:42 PM,
> melinda2u@... writes:
>
> << That idiot teacher could do no better than mark
> up my
> paper for "incorrect sentence structure". Makes you
> wonder if any of these teachers actually consider
> the
> merits of REAL Literature, with all it's rule
> breaking
> and original perspective. Or, do they actually
> Enjoy
> the crap examples in grammar text books? >>
>
> When I was teaching writing to kids I very rarely
> commented on the structure
> or content, because in many cases that was their
> private business. I usually
> ONLY went for mechanics of writing.
>
> When I'm teaching beginning calligraphers, I don't
> want them to imagine what
> a Carolingian "f" COULD have looked at, I want them
> to learn to copy actual
> period examples.
>
> When I'm helping people learn to play recorder (as I
> did with Kirby a couple
> of nights ago), I really do want them to tongue
> every note. YES there are
> exceptions galore after you learn to do it right,
> but it's one thing to
> choose when not to tongue, and another not to have
> the skill to do it and so
> just skip and claim "art."
>
> With calligraphy, in fact there might be hundreds of
> different examples of
> extant Carolingian hand, with a large range of forms
> of letters. But that's
> not the same as "unlimited" or "no rules." Some of
> the most wonderful
> calligraphy is someone "doing a riff" on some
> descender, or getting way artsy
> with a line ending or a capital letter.
>
> Literature is full of exceptions. Jazz is full of
> exceptions.
>
> But when a person is cluefree about how to do
> something "right," his
> "embellishments" aren't creativity so much as
> flailing around.
>
> Some people's flailing around creates art. There
> are artists and musicians
> who pretty much made it up on their own. Some have
> an audience of one,
> though, and are only amusing themselves. Others
> discover something that has
> broader appeal.
>
> < Or, do they actually Enjoy
> the crap examples in grammar text books?>>
>
> I have always enjoyed the history of English, the
> technicalities of
> punctuation, the changing fashions involving word
> use and style. I've never
> expected everyone else to think it was cool, but I
> actually enjoyed the crap
> examples in grammar textbooks, sometime.
>
> That said, I never once used a grammar text book
> when I was teaching. We
> kept the books in their boxes at the back of the
> room, and used dictionaries.
> We played games with parts of speech sometimes, and
> goofed with them various
> ways. We would lay out all the synonyms we could
> think of for something and
> try to identify without looking them up which were
> of what origin, and which
> were the oldest.
>
> <<But I am certain that the passion I have for
> the written word was long delayed due to those years
> of forced writing.
>
> <<Shame on them.>>
>
> I'm not ashamed for using writing to help people
> write. Our usual in-class
> writing system was that they were to write three
> one-page (or longer)
> anythings. Little stories, reviews, opinions. It
> didn't matter. Three
> pages. They picked the one they liked best, or
> thought was the best on top,
> fastened the three together and over the weekend I
> read through at least all
> the top pages, sometimes more. I wasn't criticizing
> their organization or
> style. That was going to get better as they just
> wrote more. I was only
> looking at mechanics. Spelling, grammar,
> punctuation, sentence structure.
>
> I could have collected my paycheck without doing
> that. I could have passed
> out those books and gone through some dumbass
> exercise every day and NEVER
> worked outside my prep period, but I didn't.
> Because I like writing and I
> know writing is scary, I tried to help make it a
> common, non-threatening,
> amusing thing for them. If they hadn't had me as an
> English teacher they
> would have had someone worse. So I'm not very
> ashamed of the way I taught.
>
> I'm somewhat ashamed that I couldn't change things
> more.
>
> Sandra
>


=====
: D Melinda

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writing4health

--- In AlwaysLearning@y..., Melinda <melinda2u@y...> wrote:
>
I imagine even Talking could become an
> activity to loathe and run from if you were
> "instructed" in how to do it "properly". And if
> every time you opened your mouth some "expert" opined
> on your every word.
>
This is interesting Melinda. My youngest son was put into speech
therapy in junior kindergarten. He was set up with a special summer
program at the hospital. He was supposed to go twice a week
throughout the summer. Upon intake, the speech pathologist did not
feel he needed intervention. She felt most of his difficulties would
self-correct. However, since the school requested the intervention
she began a program. After one week, she cut the sessions to one a
week. Then after three weeks she "graduated" him from the program.

The next year in school, he was back in speech therapy within the
school system. He participated until the end of Grade One. This was
his last year of formal schooling. They kept sending home target
sounds that he was pronouncing correctly at home. I think that he was
self-conscious at school. Therefore it was more of a school related
condition than a physical difficulty.

Granted he has a class 2 maloccusion which he needs to have
orthopedic intervention for. This has caused a little difficulty, but
I believe the school-based speech therapy drew too much attention to
the problem and did not offer solutions in respect to the skeletal
defect. He is doing much better at home. Of course!!

Kathy