As the summer waned and I prepared to start the year teaching in a new high school, I realized how uncertain I felt in the skin of my new classroom, colleagues, curriculum, and community. Quickly, I realized my opening day plans were slipping into traditional territory: Let’s make sure classroom expectations are clear from day one, I thought. Let’s jump into a whole-class novel right away, I mused.
This was my insecurity speaking, moving schools for the first time in my career from the 7-9 building where I spent twenty years to a 10-12 building on the other side of my school district.
Fortunately, I spoke with a colleague from my new school, one of those teachers beloved and respected by all her fellow teachers for her wisdom. She told me, “Start with writing!” and with a gulp, I realized that was a conclusion this Moving Writers blogger should have already reached.
Specifically, she suggested having my tenth-grade students craft a “My Ten” column, in the manner of The New York Times and as recommended by their ever-impressive Learning Network. In this monthly feature of the Arts section, a journalist introduces a celebrity who then writes “about their top 10 cultural must-haves — the books, movies, songs, hobbies, clothes, art, people, places or cherished objects that they can’t live without,” as Learning Network writer Natalie Proulx explains.
My esteemed colleague assured me, the writing this produced would be “voiceful . . . and as they interview and write introductions for each other, they will get to know each other and you will get to know them.”
It turns out, this idea was pure gold. Sure, I learned about my students’ favorite Taylor Swift tunes, but I also learned that one of my students is building a motorcycle from scratch, and another, as he began to run out of ideas of “things” that defined him wrote about “Procrastination” as #7 on his list and “Running Out of Ideas” as his #8.
So if you felt like this year started a little iffy, consider this “My Ten” column idea for next year. And a side note: Like all of my assignments, it blows away the five paragraph essay format.
But then I got to thinking . . . might I be able to build on this assignment later in the year? Here are three possibilities I am toying with to revisit this structure for writing.
Character Analysis
What would Holden Caulfield put in his “My Ten” if he were alive in today’s world?
What details named in Pride and Prejudice would Elizabeth Bennet include on her “My Ten?”
Questions like these invite students to use a structure they already know and enjoy from my class earlier in the year with a fresh purpose: analyzing a character. Perhaps instead of a journalist’s introduction to the list, as in the original Times columns, this variation could conclude with some inferential thinking. What can we conclude about this character from this list of favorite things we created? How might some of these things arrive on the list or fall away from the list as the book progresses and the character changes?
Author Study
Knowing a thing or two about the author’s life will help us to better appreciate any book. The task of writing a “My Ten” from an author’s perspective will take students far beyond a wikipedia page in their research, poking at the more interesting and strange corners of the author’s life and preferences as they discover and deduce the “cultural must-haves” the author of the book they are reading would include.
Writing to Learn Vocabulary
I have long been a fan of employing personification to study and share new vocabulary in an engaging way. Ever since reading the book High Definition: Unforgettable Vocabulary-Building Strategies Across Genres and Subjects by Sara Holbrook and Micheal Salinger, I’ve had students writing letters of recommendation, obituaries, and resumes for vocabulary words as if they are human to magnificent effect, both in creativity and retention.
Later this year, I plan to have students write quick “My Ten” lists for a vocabulary word and share them with each other in an accessible online space.
What songs or TV shows or might “Apparition” include on their list or “Bludgeon”? And more importantly, what personalized connections will students make as they connect their own repertoire of cultural favorites to new vocabulary and then share these with classmates? And what laughter and joy will ensue as they engage in this goofy personification?
Do you see other applications for this idea? Send them my way, @theVogelman on all sorts of social media or in the comments. My book, Poetry Pauses: Teaching with Poems to Elevate Student Writing in All Genres is now available from Corwin Press or on Amazon. You can also connect with me at my website www.brettvogelsinger.com
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