I read through the Romano text and couldn't put it down. I think it's the practical and personal way that he's approaching the writing of this text. I wanted to keep reading to the next chapter and see what was in store. I think this might be the first time where a textbook (other than one filled with poetry/stories) has held my attention and made me think of potential uses in my classroom. I was (and still am) really wary of teaching creative writing but I now feel that the multigenre approach is the way to go for me!

For January 29

After an exhausting class filled with far too many moments of the deer in the headlights look it was nice to read a text filled with a process that I understand. I loved reading the Dornan chapters about the process (not product) approach to writing. One of the things that hit home with me is the idea of the competing nature of language and thought for dominance in the literary world. The text writes that "most scholars today agree that thought is bound up with language" (4). If thought if bound up with language, then what about a person who can't express their thoughts through language; an ELL student may struggle with written and verbal expression and his or her thoughts are in no way less complex than a student with a mastery of the classroom language. I guess I really started to focus on the importance of writing being a way for students to express themselves and to bring their own lives into their writing, rather than thinking about the five paragraph essay. "Writers use language to create reality of the world and these perceptions in turn create them as thinkers and users of language" (7); it seems that what you write creates an identity for you as a writer and that can be an extremely powerful tool. Dornan also says that "writers necessarily bring their linguistic, cultural, and experiential backgrounds to bear on the writing process, and good writing teachers recognize the legitimacy of those experiences in the writing of their students and nurture them" (6)

I found it really interesting that some schools “...have policies forbidding or limiting that use of personal journals, sometimes as a result of parents’ complaints that they don’t want their children revealing personal family matters in their journals...Under these circumstances the teacher has a responsibility spelled out in some school districts, to report this to the counselor or principal” (48) It seems like in a journal for school a student might not be open about talking about such personal topics as family situations; I would love it if a student was that comfortable with the environment (and the teacher) established in a classroom, that they would be that open to sharing. If the English/Language Arts classroom is the only place where a student feels safe to write their feelings in a journal, then so be it. At least they're getting it off of their mind/chest/heart and onto paper. I really feel like the best writing comes when something in the extreme happens--a death in the family, an engagement, a broken heart. If English is the classroom where a student feels free to write, then they should have that opportunity. I tried to find some information about Minnesota and if this state had the mandatory reporting rule with journaling, but I was unsuccessful. I also wasn't able to find any of the states or schools that have these journaling restrictions.

The Atwell article was completely different than anything I've read about establishing a Writer's Workshop. I found it really interesting that reading and language arts are separate and the teacher in this article had three days of writer's workshop and two days for teaching literature/grammar/other language arts topics. I think it's a really interesting concept to have Writer's Workshop as the focus of a class, instead of a unit within 8th grade language arts. I took a look at Maine's Department of Education website and didn't find anymore specifics about Maine being "one of the few states where reading is generally taught as a separate course from English language arts right up through eighth grade" (Atwell 62) http://www.maine.gov/education/lres/ela/6to8.html