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Writing Tips from an Education Course

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New to the literary world? Just want to improve on your already strong literary background? Get tips on your language skills here.

Writing Tips from an Education Course

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby miyumi on Fri Feb 09, 2007 7:42 pm

I am studying to be a high school math teacher. For some reason, the education department thinks this means I need to learn how to teach writing. Actually, I know why: Writing Across the Curriculum. WAC. And that's what it is- whack. Basically it means that every teacher in participating schools has to give writing assignments that are graded for things like spelling and grammar. Except, this class isn't about teaching spelling and grammar. It's about using existing literature to teach good writing.

So why am I posting about this here?

Well, the text-books I have to read for this class actually give some good advice about writing. The two books that I will be pulling from extensively (I'll give chapter and page number where the idea is, but it will all be rephrased into a writing tip instead of a teaching tip) are referenced in this post. I will be calling the books "Ray" and "J&T", since that is what the syllabus calls them.

J&T: Children's Literature, Briefly. Jacobs, James S.; Tunnell, Michael O. Pearson Merrill Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey, copyright 2004. (If that's not enough information to identify it, too bad)

Ray: Wondrous Words: Writers and Writing in the Elementary Classroom. Ray, Katie Wood. National Council of Teachers of English, Urbana, Illinois, copyright 1999.

And let none say I didn't reference. Now, I know these are about "children's literature" and "elementary ed", but I'm in my forth and last year of learning how to teach, and most of the classes I've taken that both elem. and sec. ed. had to take were geared towards elementary. What does this mean? It means that I have had three years of experience in sifting through elementary techniques and tips to find the ones that apply to high schoolers as well. And I've actually done an impressive job, according to my professors, of taking an irrelevant class and forcing it to become relevant to both the age range of the students and the content of the subject which I will be teaching.

One last thing. I am also required to find forty books that demonstrate good writing skills. A lot of these will be picture books (not by my choice, we're required eleven besides one in each genre...), and it has already been stated multiple times that just because it's a picture book doesn't mean the techniques and skills used in writing it aren't relevant to older writings. So, I will be providing the titles, author, and genre of each book I chose, along with at the very least why I chose it, if not excerpts of good writing that I found in the book.

So, this is the intro post. In an hour or two, I will make my first actual tips post. I will be posting about the books as I finish reading them, so that will be sporadic.

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Tips: 0.00 INK Postby miyumi on Fri Feb 09, 2007 8:28 pm

Overall, there won't be nearly as much good writing tips from the second book as the first... however, in the early chapters there are a few places where entire pages are good things to take into account. I'll attempt summarizing them. If you need something explained in greater detail, you can ask me either here or in pm if you feel embarrassed by asking.

Basically, posts about the two main books will be set up like this:

Book, chapters I had to read this week

Chapter, page number, quote/idea (may be entered a few times. If no new numbers, assume it's continuing text)

Tonight, I'm posting about both. Here we go:

J&T, 1-3,5,6

Chap 2, Pg 15: What defines a "good book". It talks about how there's two definitions, quality and taste. It goes more in depth on both.

Quality is defined by many things.

Style and Language refers to the words chosen and how those words are arranged, or used. The style a book is written in can emphasize the tone of the entire book. The example given is using short sentences to convey a panicky feel.

Characters must be unique and believable. They must feel real, or the reader cannot identify with them.

Plot is... well, I'm sure most here already know this one. If you don't, don't be ashamed, just ask.

(cutting out illustrations, as we are looking for writing ideas)

Pacing refers to the speed of the story. Does it fly by in an instant with one thing happening right after another giving the reader no chance for a breath, or does it mosey on, taking its own sweet time to get to the conflict, and then get through the conflict? This can vary within the book itself.

Setting again, another one that most here probably already understand. If not, I will be happy to elucidate for you.

Tension is about the feel of the book. If there's no tension in there anywhere, usually the story will be put down rather quickly. Suspense is key.

Design and Layout involved anything visual. Margins, size of text, placement on the page, and other things like that.

Mood is the atmosphere a book has. Usually it can be described as one word: dark, cheery, exciting, scary, weird. Okay, I made that last one up. Congrats to any who spotted it.

Accuracy is mostly for historical fiction, biographies, and fiction that's based in this world. Any reference to facts that can be looked up, should be. (No, Dan Brown shouldn't be exempt from this, but he chose to ignore that, which is why plenty of people despise his work)

Tone apparently means the author's attitude toward the subject or audience.

Point of view is decided by the narrator. First person? Third person?

Theme refers to the central idea behind the text.

Also, at the end of this (which is on page 16, btw. I shortened it quite a bit.) it says that the three most critical are style and language, character, and plot.

and a direct quote from page 16: "One additional characteristic worth noting is believability. The key to creating a good book is to make everything believable."

Actually, I think that's enough for my first post. I'm going to have to do this in many posts. Don't worry, after tonight, I'll be posting about each book separately. Still to post: the section in chapter three in this book and the bits from Ray.

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Tips: 0.00 INK Postby miyumi on Fri Feb 09, 2007 9:13 pm

J&T, same week

Chap 3, pg 23 "Good writers know readers need specific information - details that enter through the senses - and take the trouble to provide it. Lesser writers generalize. The difference between providing sensory detail and generalizing is the difference between showing and telling."

It goes on to give an example about having an introverted friend suddenly get really excited about a date, making "us" excited to. The friend calls, and simply tells "us" that it was ten times better than imagined before hanging up, and we are left sitting there feeling very unsatisfied.

"We want details, not because we are nosy, but because we can't understand without them. We can participate vicariously in the evening only when we have enough facts:" and lists a bunch of random stuff that we'd want to know.

"The detail we need from the printed page so we can participate in an experience comes to us in various forms: precise vocabulary, figurative language, dialogue, music in language, understatement, and surprise observations."

It then goes on to give more intricate detail about this; again, if you want more in-depth about any of them, ask. It gives elements for weak writing commonly found in children's books on page 30.

Now on to the other one! Scared yet?

Ray, 1,2,4

Chap 1, pg 15: Learn what you need to know about writing from reading. When writers read, they learn vicariously about words, phrases, spellings, and stylistic idiosycrasies.

pg 16: Writers reread something because something in the passage was well put, or because they have read something (a style or technique) that they wish to write themselves and they think it's not beyond their reach. Having a community of writers working and studying writing together can help bring more things within reach. Slow down to reread something that was noticed in the works of an experienced writer, to figure out how it was done.

pg 17: "While any writer's style is individual, it is not unique."

pg 18: "Our writing acts are all individual in that we are one person writing about one topic at one moment in time for some purpose, but the act of how we go about doing that is not unique." "Everything we do as writers we have known in some fashion as readers first.

pg 19: "The notion of a writer's style being something that is unique..." can "...shut down a writer's ability to learn from other writers in any intention way, though the vicarious learning will still take place." "Once we embrace out individuality and let go of a misguided, impossible-to-fulfill need to have a unique writing style, we can get on to the business of really learning to write well." (Yes, she italicized that in the book.)

NEXT: It talks about "THE LIST", you know, the don'ts. Don't use run-on sentences, don't use sentence fragments... all those. Well, those are very true in formal writing, so follow them for essays. But creative writing is, well, creative. And that is the general idea of this next bit: when can those rules be broken?

pg. 20: "We were seeing fragments that were complete thoughts, run-ons conveying a sense of desperation or excitement, texts that flowed beautifully but - belyin gclear beginnings, middles and ends - could have been organized in many different ways. And sentences starting with "and" that made perfect endings to perfect texts." Ha ha ha on that last one, talking up your own piece of work...

pg 21. "language is there to be used, in any manner possible, to make meaning Human beings invented language. Its use is not a fixed, rule-bound principle of the universe that existed before us or outside of us.

pg 24. "grammatical and usage concepts made a lot more sense when they came from the inside out", meaning that it's easier to learn grammar from seeing it used than from being handed a list of definitions (a noun mean x, a verb means y, a ...)

pg 26. talks about a writer's office work, which is the gathering of ideas and crafting of a piece of work. It goes into a couple different ways to do any of those things (including a couple in each stage of crafting).

Pause: they start to use examples from a magazine article. Gary Smith, "Eyes of the Storm" from Sports Illustrated, pages 92 and 93 from March 2, 1998.

She identifies several techniques, and gives an example both from that article and then from another work in another genre- a different one each time. I'll give the titled headings and quote anything I had highlighted.

pg 29: Making a Long Story Short, Using Print to Match Meaning

pg 30: "manipulated print and spelling and wordplay for effect", Intentional Vagueness, On-Your-Mark, Get-Set, Go Colon

pg 31: "a colon... gets the reader ready for a listing of things that will follow", Repeating Sentence Structures, "vignettes that each start with a repeated sentence structure", Close Echoes, "A close echo is when writers repeat a word, usually a function-type word, that isn't necessary to repeat" (that lead on into the next page, and it's used to tie things together.)

pg 32: Effective Use of "And", "When a writer wants to convey a sense... of the vastness of a list of things, he or she will frequently connect those things using "and" again and again, instead of commas, to get the vastness across." Runaway Sentence

pg 33: "A 'runaway sentence' ... written long on purpose, to help us feel the desperation. ... Runaway sentences always convey some sense of either desperation, excitement, panic, or joy. Some sense of carried-awayness or out-of-controllness" Commenting on the Text

pg 34: "Sometimes writers just sort of leave their texts for a moment, leave what they are saying alone for a moment, and have a word with their readers, person to person." Question Series

pg 35: Repetitions and Complete Sentence Fragments, "It is OK to use a word repeatedly if that is the meaning you need, if that word dominates the meaning you want to convey."

pg 36: "sometimes a description of something can stand quite on its own in a text."

Okay, that list is done. Next it talks about reading like a writer and connecting styles you see in one text to the same style in another text.

pg 38: "Writers use similar crafting techniques to convey the same kinds of meanings, not to write about the same kinds of topics."

pg 40: "Realizing that the craft of writing is ageless, genreless, and topicless can do another thing for us as well - it can help us to see the work of our youngest writers in a new light."

pg 41: "As you study the craft of writing, you will often see things that are most definitely techniques -... but you won't know what to call them."

pg 42: "If you can describe the work you see a technique doing, if perhaps you've seen another writer doing this same thing with words, if you can imagine writing this way in a text of your own, then you are definitely seeing a technique of the craft."

pg 43: "Being able to think through other choices a writer had for how he or she might have written something... often helps you see why the writer chose to write something the way he or she did... also helps you to understand writing more clearly as a process of decision making."

pg 44: "A structural crafting technique is a way of using words that holds together either a whole text or a part of a text"

pg 45: "ways with words... are crafting techniques that stand by themselves and do not do any work in conjunction with other parts of the text."

A lot of info to cover in one week, no? Just think, we get to review all this at our next meeting (every Tuesday from 5:30pm-8:20pm.)

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Tips: 0.00 INK Postby miyumi on Tue Feb 13, 2007 10:54 pm

Here it begins, book number 1 of 40

Title: Bridge to Terabithia
Author: Katherine Paterson
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Publisher: Harper Trophy
© 1977
Awards:

Summary: A young boy is challenged both physically and mentally by a new girl in his school. They eventually become best friends and together learn many lessons about life and dealing with other people.

Literary Devices:
Pg 1- Simile, idioms
Pg 2- Personification
Pg 4- Imagery
Pg 30- Imagery
Pg 32- Alliteration, Dialogue
Pg 53-56, Poetic Justic

Extension Activities
Part one: Every person has an inner self. This self is either someone others don’t usually see, or has some trait that the person wants to have but doesn’t. Make a character which highlights your inner self, and detail a profile. Include a physical description, the personality types, any distinguishing characteristics/quirks, and one other pertinent fact about your inner self.
Part two:
Choice 1: Write a journal entry which identifies the qualities your inner self has that you don’t or don’t usually, why you’d prefer to have this quality or why you hide it, and one small thing you could do to try and be the kind of person you want to be.
Choice 2: Write a journal entry in the persona of your inner self.

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Tips: 0.00 INK Postby miyumi on Wed Feb 14, 2007 11:12 pm

Book two of forty, another one schools like to assign... indeed, I am required to read it and encouraged to use it in the file.

Author: Lois Lowry
Genre: Fantasy
Age Classification: Junior Novel
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston
© 1993
Awards:
ALA Best Book for Young Adults
ALA Notable Book for Children
Booklist Editors' Choice
Horn Book Fanfare Selection
IRA/CBC Children's Choice
1994 Newbery Medal Book
School Library Journal, Best Books of the Year
1997 Heartland Award for Excellence
1997 Buckeye Children's Book Award (OH)

Summary: A young boy becomes the Receiver of Memories and learns the truth about the past and the present.

Literary Devices:
Point of View: Pg. 5-6
Flashback: Pg. 1-2; Pg. 3-4; 54-55
Mood: Pretty much the whole book (Bland- unfeeling community; small sharp points)


Extension Activities:

Part one: In class discussion- The Receiver of Memories is held in highest honor, while the position of Birth Mother is considered a very low honor. Discuss what this tells us about this community.

Part two: In your journals, write about which position you would like to be on and why. If it is different, tell which position you think you would end up in, and why. If there is no position mentioned in the book, see if you can’t think of a likely one that would fit you which was probably in the background, just not specified.
Last edited by miyumi on Wed Feb 14, 2007 11:57 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Tips: 0.00 INK Postby miyumi on Wed Feb 14, 2007 11:55 pm

Book three, recommended by a friend.

Title: Saint George and the Dragon
Author: Retold by Margaret Hodges, Illustrated by Trina Schart Hyman
Genre: Fantasy
Age Classification: Picture Book
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company; Boston
© 1984
Awards:
1985 Caldecott Medal Winner, A.L.A.
Pennsylvania Library Association Carolyn W. Field Award
Best Book for Children by Pennsylvania Author, 1985
Keystone State Reading Association. Keystone to Reading Book Award, 1985.

Summary: The red cross knight learns of his past, then fights a dragon to free a princess’s kingdom and win her hand in marraige.

Literary Devices:
Repetition: focus on the repetition in the days of fighting.
Symbols: this would be a discussion topic. Dragon, knight, red cross, spear, sword, river, tree
Imagery: focus on either the fighting or the healing

Extension Activities

Part one: Discuss what idea is repeated in the full class. Also discuss the different symbols used and what they could mean, keeping in mind the medieval time period.

Part two: In journals, write how the symbols could apply to your life. Write a story about something you overcame, using medieval symbols.

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Tips: 0.00 INK Postby miyumi on Sun Feb 18, 2007 4:44 pm

Ray:

Chapter 3:
Pg. 48: “What a writer needs to write well is a good imagination.� “a good writer’s imagination is made up … of a sophisticatede repertoire of ideas for how to go about writing and how, particularly, to fashion texts. Really good writers can imagine all kinds of things to do with text, and this imagination comes from their sense of craft, a sense garnered over time from reading like writers and from writing themselves – trying out the crafts they have come to understand.�

Pg. 49: She talks about an important piece of the writing process being “envisioning, the ability to imagine what a draft could be before it is even started, or as it is in process, being able to envision how you might write the next words, and the next.�

Pg. 51-52: envisioning how to write about the idea, looking at different forms of writing- series of diary entries, series of poems, repeating lines, see-sawing text, shifting perspectives in the middle, layering stories inside each other, then envisioning writing the topic each of those ways before even touching a draft. “If we wanted the students to be able to write well, we had to help them see a range of possibilities for how they might do so.�

Pg. 59 “It is a mistake to think that every time a writer takes a piece to publication he or she needs a new topic to start writing again.� “It’s not the topic that matters to the growth – it’s the kinds of meanings made and the variety of ways a writer can go about writing that bring about the growth.�

Pg. 60: Writing about the same topic different ways “helps a writer understand how to shape and reshape an interesting topic in different ways, it shows a writer that any one topic doesn’t dictate any one specific kind of writing, and the combination of these in a writer’s understandings can give that writer great dexterity.�

“Writers go back to drafts not because the drafts are bad an dneed fixing, but to see what else is possible And to see what else is possible you have to be able to see what’ not there yet.�

Ends this chapter saying that envisioning text will eventually become natural for those who practice it.

Chapter 5

Pg. 90: There are two main questions about the craft of writer’s office work that seem to make the most difference in student writing. The first question is ‘What makes a writer choose to begin a project?’ The second question is “What do writers do once they’ve started mving toward a writing project?�

Pg. 92: “a topic often begins just with a writer being drawn toward an idea; that by writing around this idea the writer finds what is important to say; and that the writer then searches for the genre and structure that makes the most sense.

Pg. 93: “it’s not what a piece of writing is about, but how it’s written, that makes good writing good�

Pg. 94: “For experienced writers, the intention to do good writing is the driving force behind drafting and revision, not behind topic selection.�

Pg. 95: “Experienced writers begin moving toward writing projects not because they have great ideas, bu because they have good reasons to write With good reasons to write behind them, experienced writers know that any idea can become a good idea.�

“Good reasons to Write:
1. Passion or intrigue for a topic or an idea
2. Audience or an occasion
3. Purpose to fulfill
4. Pull of a genre�

Pg 96: “Countless writing projects have begun his way, by a writer taking the time to notice life, hatch an idea, and keep the idea burning long enough for it to become intriguing.� “many, many writing projects start from very small, very contained ideas, and often not even ideas for plot lines or poetry or memoir – just ideas, just things a writer finds interesting but has no idea as to where they will lead.�

Pg 97: “Writers prewrite all the time, even before they are actually engaged in a draft for a specific purpose.� “They live their lives prewriting, imagining possibilities and seeing the potential for writing in the world around them.�

Pg. 98: when the purpose is an audience “the writer thinks and writes about the audience at first, eventually making drafting decisions (topic, genre, structure) on the basis of what will work for that audience.�

Pg. 99: “Having an audience or an occasion in mind moves a writer forward because of the anticipation of having that one reader for whom your writing will make all the difference.�

Pg 102-104: writing is an active process

“Things Writers Did to Develop Their Writing Projects
- Took photographs of the subject and wrote off those
- Went to a library and did research on a place that interested the writer (for setting)
- Found criminal record of abductions
- Did research on explorations, diaries, logbooks
- Used sounds in a place to generate ideas and memories
- Imagined herself a a person in a certain historical time period
- Visited a museum
- Interviewed family members about a historical event they experienced
-Immersed herself in a culture she was writing about
- Wrote down a conversation her children were having
- Learned to do something her characters were going to do (work a weaving loom)�

and generalized as
“Developing a Writing Project before It’s Drafted
- Read books on a topic, a time period, a kind of person, making notes and list of ideas and facts
- Search the Internet for information
- Observe in a setting related to your topic
- Search public documents and records
- Visit a place (like a museum) where there are artifacts of the life and times you will write about
- Learn some skill (like pottery making) your characters will have
- Have an experience (like spending a night in a cave) your characters might have
- Gather artifacts such as photographs and mementos
- Talk to some expert in a field related to your topic
- Talk to other people who remember something you remember
- Talk to people in general about issues related to your topic
- Talk through your ideas and let your listener ask you questions
- Talk to someone “who was there�
- Gather opinions about a subject
- Write questions about your topic and answer them
- Write off words related to your topic and see where your thinking leads you
- Make lists of all kinds of ideas
- Make lists of possible first lines for your piece – in difference genres
- Make lists of things about your characters’ lives, your settings, your possible plot lines
- Make lists of people and place names
- Make lists of related memories
- Read lots of different texts like a writer, getting ideas for how you might write�

Pg. 104: Think about the following questions:

“‘Who could you talk to in relation to this topic?’
‘What could you read that might help you?’
‘Where could you go? What might you do?’
‘What things could you collect?’�

Pg. 105: “one way to study the craft of an author’s office work is to hypothesize about what’s behind the actual pieces of writing that the author has published.�

Pg. 107: Research what writers actually do when preparing to write something.

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Tips: 0.00 INK Postby miyumi on Thu Feb 22, 2007 6:51 pm

I AM SO SORRY! I read the J&T chapter on time, but it didn't have much at all worth noting. I forgot to post what I did note though....

so here it is:


J&T Chapter 7: Traditional Fantasy

Pg. 72: “The definition of traditional fantasy is that the literature (1) originated orally and (2) has no author. Therefore, we often associate these tales with a collector or reteller.�

Traditional stories have different standards. Modern characters must be well developed. Traditional characters are meant to be symbolic of certain basic human traits, often good or evil.

Pg. 73: “traditional stories from around the world are basically alike because fundamental human characteristics and motivations are universal.�

Pg. 75: “However simple and straightforward traditional fantasy may seem, it is the mother of all literature.�

The values: 1- suspension of disbelief; 2- works on emotions, very vivid; 3- developing the capacity to value, to believe; 4- the ability to hope

76-77 lists types of tales
79-82 lists major points against traditional tales, and the counterpoints.

As always, if you would like me to expand on a specific area, then just ask me. It will happen, I promise.

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Tips: 0.00 INK Postby miyumi on Thu Feb 22, 2007 7:51 pm

Ray, Chapter 6: The organized Inquiry

Mostly, this is going to be about questions to ask when reading like a writer, and why to ask them. I’m not going to bother with page numbers, but chap 6 is pages 115-137. I’m paraphrasing almost all of this, rewording it to be about you, the writer, and not about teaching writers.

Begin each inquiry with:
-What do you notice in the writing you would like to think about?
Making it predictable will help you start thinking about reading like a writer purposely, and eventually reflexively, while reading.

First, read it like a reader. Get to know the text as a reader, reflecting on how it affects you as a reader. Maybe have a discussion about it with someone, or write a journal entry on it. This could be on the same day as the inquiry, or weeks before the inquiry. The point is to know the story really well and make your natural response as a reader before starting the inquiry.

Read through it again, making a list of things you notice. Divide the insights into those that relate to structure and those that relate to “ways-with-words�. “structural crafts are ways in which parts of the text work together, ways-with-words crafts are instances of crafting that stand alone� (pg 119). Almost always the second one will be longer than the first. Structure will probably only have one or two things under it, may even have nothing if the structure is not obvious.

“The Five Parts to Reading Like a Writer

1. Notice something about the craft of the text.
2. Talk about it and make a theory about why a writer might use this craft.
3. Give the craft a name.
4. Think of other texts you know. Have you seen this craft before?
5. Try and envision using this crafting in your own writing.� (pg 120)

Notice:

-keep in mind, you’re trying to notice “writerly� things, not “readerly� things. Noticing “readerly� things is not a bad thing, it’s just not what you are trying for right now. It is often possible to reword it, to see the craft behind what you notice as a reader.

Pg 122- list of “readerly� things might notice, and questions to turn it into writerly thing

He writes it so it has a lot of action in it The whole thing is just action.
(How is this “action feel� accomplished?)
The text just flows. It flows so beautifully from one part to the next.
(What does “flow� mean?)
The text is very descriptive. Everything is described well.
(Where, exactly, is a great descriptive place?)
The ending is so perfect. It just brings everything together.
(What words accomplish this perfection?)


I would probably add in “How does it ‘flow’?�, but she was just using one for each of the question words.

Talk/make a theory

It is important to make a theory about why the author wrote it this way. First, you get “right on top� of it, dissecting the what, where, and possibly how much. Then, move on to the why. Make it a general question, “Why would an author use this craft in this place?� so that it’s easier to see the craft as a thing that can be used by others, unlike the ideas other authors have. The goal is not to find the real reason the author used it that way, but to see the possibilities for why it could be used.

Name

Name it. This talks about the importance of having a name when talking about it in the general community, but then it also says it’s important to help you notice it as a writer when you are reading in the future. If it already has an official name, use that.

Other texts

Again, this is about seeing how it is used in other texts, and seeing that it IS used in other texts. Goes back to her whole notion that the craft does not belong to any one writer, that writer’s styles are individual, not unique.

Envision

This is where you look at the technique outside the text. Write out a sentence about it: “If I am writing, and I want to ____, I use (insert craft- description or name- here).� Must be general, so you can use this craft in any piece.

She points out that studying craft through this inquiry process is time-consuming, so it’s best done under two circumstances. 1- for those who are just beginning to read like writers, doing this often is a good way to get into that habit. In that case, it’s not a matter of finding all the techniques at first, but of learning to think about the ones you can find. 2- To study a specific technique further, where you want examples of writing that definitely feature that technique (guess what chapter 7 is about? Her library. That one is pretty well going to be verbatim.)

Summary of critical points (page 136)

“-Use criteria related to excellence in craft in writing to select a text for study.
-Spend time becoming comfortable with the text and responding to it first as readers.�

Focus attention on the words
Follow the predictable way of thinking to read like writers and study the text (relists the five points)
Watch balance of time. Need to have a chance to try out the crafts studied in your own writing.

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miyumi
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Re: Writing Tips from an Education Course

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Tramp on Thu Nov 22, 2007 5:23 pm

Although this comment is nearly a year belated, I would like to mention that poor Lois Lowry forgot to place a title with her book. ;)
Knock, knock. That's what she said, mind you. And that's all she said, if you know what I'm talking about! And if you do, would you kindly tell me? Because I sure don't.

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