September 25, 2014

Today you handed in your final place pieces.
You worked on a piece where you are haunted by a piece of clothing.
Here is an example.

September 15, 2014

Today we workshopped the following place pieces:

• Quinn
• Charlene
• Will

For homework read and comment on the following pieces:

• Ali
• Corrina
• Chris
• Nikki

September 9, 2014

Today we shared our place excerpts.
We made a list of places we are all familiar with.
school
school bathroom
bus stop
school bus
house...one room
field (meadow)
field (sports)
locker room
forest
hospital
dentist
graveyard
park
playground
beach
grocery store
walmart?
restaurant
camp
amusement park
farmer's market
cafe

Select one place and write about it showing emotion through the use of descriptive detail.

Friday September 5, 2014

Today we're generating a list of horrid sentences and then making them stronger. We talked about sensory detail and the importance of it in creative writing.

The "bad" sentences we generated are as follows:

1. The boy smelled bad.
2. The cat wanted a treat.
3. I went to the store.
4. The night was cold.
5. They walked in.
6. The apple is gross.
7. The man looked sad.
8. She laughed very hard.
9. The garden was nice.
10. The man grabbed the flowers.
11. It was raining.
12. The house is white.
13. The kid was scared.
14. The band was loud.
15. Running is hard.

You selected eight of the fifteen and made them descriptive. We then shared them in class.

We made a list of places we had strong feelings toward. The list is as follows:

Homework: Strong writers tend to be strong readers. Find a piece (paragraph, poem, whatever) that describes place. Bring it to class to share with your peers.

Day One: September 3, 2014

Why I Write
There is an entire tumblr dedicated to this question. We're not able to easily access this from school, so here is a Pinterest page that has a few on them. Some of them are poignant, others are silly. All of them are reasons to write.
Here are a few.

There are a few reasons. Here are yours (in no particular order).

• I couldn't imagine a world without books.
• I like to make art with a pencil and paper rather than paint and a canvas.
• And so, I write; not because I can, but because it is the only way to grant my imaginary life.
• Here, in the savannah of white and blue, the letters strung together seem to stay until the pink eraser sends them away.
• I yank the chain on my laughter and let go when I write.
• I love hand writing. I don't get that same smooth, consistent, aching feeling when I type on a computer.
• I write to express myself, to let others know how I'm feeling, or sometimes just to let myself know.
• You can live out dreams or anything you would want to do without doing it.
• I want it to feel natural again, instead of struggling to find the words that used to appear so easily to me.
• Putting things down on paper--school related or not--helps me focus more and lifts a weight off my shoulders.
• Scratching of graphite was relaxing, the clicking of keys was comforting, and I indulged in how smooth words could be. Like silk for the mind.
• It feels good when people read it and enjoy it, or when they connect to one of my book characters.
• Writing my emotions down is my therapy.
• Having my emotions poured onto a piece of paper is pretty beautiful to me.
• I can say the reason that I write is because of my dreams.
• I have also written just to day things I never had the guts to say in person to someone.