mrfitzfinkle

November 1, 2021October 31, 2021mrfitzfinkle

Reading As Writers: Big Picture and Closeup

Great student writers, the ones whose work I can’t wait to read, notice what writers do and begin to see how it all works together.

October 4, 2021October 3, 2021mrfitzfinkle

Big Picture/Closeup: a model for reading and writing

Closeup elements are how the story is told. Big Picture elements are the story itself.

September 6, 2021September 5, 2021mrfitzfinkle

The Choices Writers Make (If Allowed)

“…in many writing classrooms, students are learning to write by not being allowed to do any of the things “real” writers do: make choices.”

June 7, 2021June 7, 2021mrfitzfinkle

The Power of Writing Collaborative Fiction

The experience of writing a novel together didn’t inhibit individual creativity – it made them all want to go home and write more on their own.

May 3, 2021May 3, 2021mrfitzfinkle

The World’s Most Boring Topics

I tell them that just as a good standup comedian can read out of the phone book and make it funny, a good writer can take a dull topic and make it interesting.

April 5, 2021April 5, 2021mrfitzfinkle

Providing Experience to Write About: the Quicksand River Un-assignment

We often give them common prompts, or common texts sets with common prompts. We give them common pieces of literature to write about. So why not a common experience?

March 1, 2021mrfitzfinkle

Some Doodles About Writing

It’s good for us as writing teachers to try our hand at some form of writing on a regular basis. It can teach you a lot. I think we English teachers sometimes have an urge to make our student writers perfect writers… RIGHT NOW. We sometimes feel that too many errors mean they can’t write. […]

February 1, 2021January 31, 2021mrfitzfinkle

Writing is Not Monolithic

…these students had a very, very limited idea of what writing was.

January 11, 2021January 7, 2021mrfitzfinkle

Tools Over Rules: Writing as Choice-Making, not Compliance

In fact, students often think of writing as an act of compliance – follow the teacher’s instruction, receive a passing grade.

October 9, 2020October 7, 2020mrfitzfinkle

How To Focus a Topic

I find many of of my students have seldom, if ever, been allowed to choose and focus their own topics. They have been, as I often say, “prompted to death.” Yet the work of choosing and focusing a topic are essential writing moves – perhaps the most important writing moves of all, because they involve […]