Spaces for Writing, Thinking, and Becoming by Dixie K. Keyes and Jessica Wiley

The Sunday Post on Ethical ELA is a year-long series featuring weekly contributions written by English language arts educator-scholars from across the country. Explore past posts here. Welcome, Dixie and Jessica!

Spaces for Writing, Thinking, and Becoming: A Vignette of a Writing Classroom by Dixie K. Keyes and Jessica Wiley

Gratitude opens the door to this writing today as I consider Dr. Sarah Donovan and this rich space she invites us into where we share our educator expressions of teaching, learning, writing, and being. So, wherever you are right now, lift your glass, your coffee cup, or your water bottle to Sarah and to those who assist her for their devoted work to the Ethical ELA blog. Cheers, Sarah!

The intent of this piece, rather than to share strategies or research, is to draw us into the vignette of a writing classroom—one that represents the reality for many writing teachers each day. Teaching writing is difficult, and those who have done it for any length of time embrace its complexities because the peripeteias always come about after the struggles…after the students find the release valve to their words and their art. Rather than resist the struggle, it is important to step into it with experience, compassion, intuition, and self-efficacy.

As I facilitated a graduate course on writing pedagogy this spring, a teacher in my course composed a vignette of her writing classroom, offering a picture through prose of the struggle–one that reminded me of my 14 years as a writing teacher. In the course, we read Natalie Goldberg, Robert Yagelski, Frank Smith, Peter Elbow, Janet Emig, Donald Graves, Donald Murray, Nancy Atwell and others…those who link writing with becoming. In a module entitled, “Finding the Theory in Practice: Facing the Myths and Realities of Writing,” my students read a piece written by a kindergarten teacher, Victoria Salvat, “So You Think They Can’t Write?” after which I invite them to compose a vignette (an incident; a scene, richly described) of a writing classroom, or writer’s workshop—one that is an ideal or one that represents writing spaces in school environments. I want to use the majority of this space to spotlight the teacher’s response. Teacher/writer Jessica Wiley’s vignette follows:

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The large classroom that was once a computer lab is now made over with new paint the fantastic color of “prison wall gray.” The posters on the wall have long gone, because for some reason the tape and hot glue does not hold. The alphabet chart is hanging on for dear life, and as the sections keep falling, it looks more like a secret code to unlock a secret vault–DEF, JKL, YZ. Unenthusiastic learners sit at their large mismatched tables, lucky to have pocket alphabet charts to use as a reference. With their Chromebooks as paperweights, they jab away as each single keystroke feels like a snail’s pace to the finish line, taking them one step further to completion. Not having quite learned the home keys, their sporadic spelling guesses hinder their thoughts. From the outside looking in, these students appear to be actively working.

The teacher, at her laptop, helps some complete a final edit. Using Google Docs, she sees what they have accomplished after Day Three. Multi-tasking, she sees some are still thinking about what to type, some are pretending to work, some have produced a paragraph, and there’s that one student–the one who questions even his own being–coming up with every excuse to confuse himself and the teacher. With a smile, the teacher just sighs and nods. “It’ll be okay, Jedd.” But, in her heart, she knows that this fiasco will drag on to infinity. This is real life. They are sinking into the world of prescribed writing.

Fast forward to the next day. The “Infinity and Beyond” student approaches the teacher and shares some exciting news. He has big plans this weekend. He loves to talk, but since there are other students to help, she tells him to write about it. He stares at her as if she had asked him to swallow a flaming arrow while tiptoeing on a bed of nails. Another student knows what he wants to write about, but he struggles with decoding, has a limited understanding of phonemic awareness and phonological awareness, and just cannot spell to save his life. She tells him to get a board and marker and she will help him in a minute. The “Pretender” just has his Google Doc up, along with five other tabs. She looks at him after closing his extra tabs on Go Guardian and he gets to work. After the third person asks to go to the bathroom, she just calmly yells through her teeth, “EVERYBODY STOP!” Directing her students to close their Chromebooks, she asks each one to get a pencil. Half of them don’t have one. She points to the container of pencils, most are barely sharpened or lacking erasers. Giving out sheets of wide-ruled paper, she tells the students to think of something that they enjoy: reading, playing football, working on the farm, a favorite teacher or subject, and then tell the person closest to them while sketching a scene.

This action creates a stadium wave of chatter. As the students discuss, she motions for them to pick up their pencils and write what they are saying. Then, it begins. One student’s hand goes up and they ask how long does it have to be. Another student’s hand raises and they ask is it due today. One more student asks how to spell every other word. And another hand shoots up and they ask how long it has to be. The teacher raises her arms as if she is the maestro about to conduct a symphony orchestra. She replies with two words: “Just write.”

Realization that success cannot happen overnight sets in. Just like a baby will not come out of the womb walking and talking, the same applies to students and writing. No matter how old, these things take time and only when ready do they take their firsts. This is all a process. A time to swallow, digest, and regurgitate. What comes up may not be appetizing, but it will be easier to see what is there to work with. With further investigation, the chunks are easily recognizable. It is a start to a journey of writing for a purpose.

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Jessica’s detailed description shows us the twists, turns, back flips, and sleepy corners of a writing classroom, yet one with a teacher who knows how to navigate within the complexities and the struggles. Jessica is a teacher who shares the intention Yagelski (2012) writes about—the act of writing that involves “understanding what happens as we write” and “in the moment” of that act (p. 191). Although, on this day, progress took a while and perhaps still eluded some, Jessica held those moments of difficulty in her experience, in her compassion, and in her intuition. And as a writer herself, she turned her writers toward themselves. Recognizing the symphony and the hard work ahead, she draped her cape on the words of Yagelski (2012) and continued the inquiry of writing and becoming. “I am less interested in what happens to our writing than in what happens as we write” (p. 191). As Yagelski and others posit, understanding that writing is an act of being, is perhaps the anchor for all meaningful writing instruction. Take heart, writing teachers, in all of those spaces you open for writing, for thinking, and for becoming.

References

Salvat, V. (2012). “So you think they can’t write?” Virginia English Bulletin.

Yagelski, R. (2012). “Writing as praxis.” English Education, Vol. 44:2, (January 2012), pp. 188-204.