Brave Writer

Glad so many of you enjoyed the word sculptures and scrounged poetry exercises.

Today, let’s write some interesting dialog.

Ask your child to pick an area of concern that is giving your child trouble. Will she continue to take piano lessons, is it a good idea to get a dog, should she go to college, does her room need redecorating, did Shakespeare really write his plays? It should be an area of moderate expertise/interest and that involves personal experience or research, if possible. Silly topics welcome.

Create a short list (four or five areas of internal conflict).

Then pick one about which your child feels passionate or knowledgeable. You can discuss the topic together for a few minutes to see if the child knows enough about the subject for writing.

One version of this exercise suggests writing each voice using a separate hand. That would mean that the right hand would write about why it’s a good idea to get a dog and the left hand would want to look at the reasons it’s not a good idea to own a dog.

I’ve written a dialog this way and it is very difficult even for me, a motivated adult writer. Yet the results were really interesting. The fact that I had to slow down so much using my left hand meant that my thoughts came at a different rate. I found myself examining an issue in a way I hadn’t anticipated at the start.

I’ve found a way to get similar results for kids without switching hands.

Use different writing instruments
Use two different writing utensils when writing your dialog.

The first speaker will be in blue marker, for instance, and the second speaker in purple crayon.

Or, the first speaker will be in pencil and the second will be written with a pen. Or perhaps, use an oil pastel and a gel pen.

The goal here is to write with contrasting utensils. It’s okay to just use two different colors of pens, but if there is a difference in the feel of the pens as well, you will achieve more interesting results. Just changing how the writing instruments feel in the hand will call up different thoughts than if you wrote in one single hand and using one single utensil the whole time.

My 13 year old son said that he really felt like two people were talking to each other by changing pens each time he switched voices. Go for as long as the writer has interest and things to say. If one “person” gets long-winded, that’s okay. Let the “voice” make his case.

To finish up:
You know the dialog is done when it has a satisfying conclusion. That doesn’t mean that the issue will necessarily be resolved. But it might mean that the issue has become clearer. Or it may be that it ends humorously. Or it may end with a pointed question that came from the dialog.

Hints for good dialog:
1. Don’t start with “hello” and don’t end with “good-bye” or “see ya.” Dive right into the meat of the issue. Start with a provocative comment such as:

Dogs pee on the carpet and chew up shoes.

Followed by an equally assertive rebuttal:

But they snuggle with you in your bed when you feel sick and no one likes you.

2. Leap to conclusions. Don’t feel you must address each concern that is raised. You can jump ahead and jump to conclusions in dialog. It moves the discussion along and helps you not labor too much.

Then follow the muse where it takes you. As in freewriting, there are no right answers.

Hidden benefits to dialog writing of this kind:

• Kids think about both sides of an argument and are thrust into the voices of each position (they are learning how to develop the experience of arguing for a viewpoint rather than reporting the arguments others have over the same issues).
• They discover that they have more to say than they knew ahead of time. There is something about tricking the brain into relaxing and playing that unearths thoughts and related ideas that are otherwise stifled in rigid assignments.
• You can punctuate it at the end and do a quick discussion of how dialog punctuation works! Look up the rules for dialog punctuation in Nitty Gritty Grammar. (Save the punctuation part for after you’ve enjoyed and praised the dialog.)
• It’s fun! (Not such a hidden benefit but worth mentioning.)

If your child shows passion for this particular issue and the ideas unearthed in the dialog are easily ordered, it is a good opportunity to come back to the topic and write it up in paragraph form (like, say, next week). Be sure to retain the quirkiness of the original but put the arguments into another form to show your kids how this kind of writing exploration can be used for “academic” writing later.

It is also possible to use this exercise as a preparation for a writing project that is related to a historical, literary or scientific topic. If the child is sufficiently saturated in the subject matter (World War II, electrons, solar system, Civil Rights Movement, Jane Austen) and has a sense of what controversy is within that topic, writing a dialog as part of the exploratory part of the writing cycle is a great way to get into the topic before crafting a three paragraph mini report or essay. Caution: Be sure that your child is up for using this exercise this way. You can try it with a low stress topic first and later use it for history, science or literature after your child feels comfortable and if your child finds it valuable.

Post your results in the comments section.

Enjoy!

Some of you may have heard of “found poetry.” I’ve designed a variant version: “Scrounged Poetry.” Using your word tickets, let’s see what kind of poetry we can write.

Here’s how it will work. (This project works best as a team effort with all the kids and mom working together.)

Choose several art prints or photographs or advertisments.
(Pictures from catalogs/magazines, photography books and/or art books work well.)

Clip the picture out if possible so you can hold the picture in your hand. If you have to leave it in a book, simply keep the pages open so that what you look at is in as flat a format as possible (undistracted by text or other pictures on the same page).

Bring your pictures to the table.
Look at the pictures for a little while silently (maybe five minutes). Choose one. No criteria. Just choose the one you like best, or the one you find most disturbing, or the one that pleases you, or makes you laugh or repels you. (If it becomes difficult to work on one photo for everyone, let each child choose a picture. That will mean working on multiple poems and you may want to do them one at a time.)

Look at it intently.
Don’t consciously try to think of moods or words or ideas. Simply enjoy noticing details. Say these outloud. Look in the corners, look at the small items and big things, notice the lines, the edges, the shapes and shadows, where the light falls. Ask your kids questions. Notice the colors or absence of colors. Ask yourself what is happening in the picture. Is there a story? Is there an event? Who is looking at whom? What is the sky doing? What is the sun doing? What mood is created in you as you look at your picture? What memories are evoked?

Let each person hold the picture and have time to look at it without any comments.

When you’ve looked quietly at your painting or picture for five or more minutes, lay the photo down and then, spread the words out on the table.
Immediately begin to arrange them in a variety of sequences. Free your words from a specific order by moving them around. Don’t get locked in. Just look for words that go with the picture and group these together in any order.

Resist the temptation to think of new words. Use the ones in your collection. You’ll use these words, images and ideas in your poem that is inspired by the picture.

The following is a list of the kinds of words you’ll want to select to help you write your poem.

Mood (emotion the picture evokes–loneliness, anger, joy, peace, confusion)
Tone (the overall feel of the picture–uplifting, disturbing, reflective)
Color
Setting
Time
Nice sounding words
Names of things, people or places
Associations (comparisons between what you see and what it reminds you of or the other way around–starting with an idea or image and finding how it relates to the picture).

Your poem may not have all of these, but having this list helps you to gather a variety.

Layer your poem with word choices and avoid adding too many words that aren’t on your lists. Control your poem by restricting the word sources. See if you can manage to fit your words to the poem. It might mean rearranging your words several times. Don’t get locked into one order in the beginning. Deliberately move them around and read them out in different arrangements to hear how they sound.

To help give your poem structure, I’ve set a few “rules” to free you to create without worry that you’re “doing it wrong.” If you are the kind of writer that hates any rules of any kind, please ignore my advice and follow the muse where she leads you.

Guidelines
Keep your poem to less than 12 lines. It should be at least 4 lines minimum.

Write your verses in either pairs (two lines per verse) or fours (four lines per verse).

Don’t rhyme it.

Don’t use punctuation or capitals.

Stick to the words you’ve collected instead of adding words that occur to you as you create your poem. You can add single words that help tie your words to specific images in the picture, if you need to.

Here’s a sample I wrote (written based on “Starry Night” by Van Gogh):

personality’s dream
hapless family of stars

a prayer
defies nature

rings of yellow
emits bright blue

easing pain
a foolproof formula

enormous and complex
endless

These are all words from my collection except for “of stars” and “of yellow.” I added these selectively to help tie my word choices into the feel of the painting.

Do this as a family poem project so that everyone’s contributions are valued and included. Then post your poems here (with a link to a picture or a short description of it.)

Enjoy!

–julie

Are your kids fed up with “assigned” writing?

Time to unhook that resistance by playing with language (instead of fighting with it). You’ll be making what are called “word tickets” and then turning them into “word sculptures.”

This activity comes from a terrific little book called, Poem Crazy. I’ve adapted it for our homeschool experience. Hang onto your word tickets! (Keep the ones you don’t use in an envelope or little dish.) I’ll post an exercise called “Scrounged Poetry” later in the week that will build on this activity. For now, have fun with words!

You’ll need:
a stack of magazines (you will be cutting them up so be sure you’re finished reading them)
notecards or stickies
glue stick
clear tape
scissors
your imagination

Your objective:
You are going to create what we call “word tickets” that will be used to create “word sculptures.”

Page through the magazines looking for words. Any words will do. Don’t edit your choices. Just dive in and start cutting. You are picking single words or two to three word phrases that pop, that engage you in some way.

Cut out the words or phrases.

Select words and phrases for 30 minutes to an hour. Keep them in a little stack.

Glue them to cardstock or notecards so they are sturdy. Cut them to the size of the word or phrase.

Next, collect some items and bring them to the kitchen table. You can tape the word tickets directly to the items in your home or you can tape them to sticky notes and then put the post-its on the items. Whatever works best for you.

You will put your word tickets on potted plants, photographs, coffee tables, candles, the crock pot, a bowl of fruit, the window, the TV, the soap dish, the handle of a door, the side of a chair, above a lock, next to the fireplace or on the screen of the computer. Notice what your word tickets do to the items in your house and allow yourself to see those items with new eyes.

A clothing catalog can be an incredible source of quality words such as:

sparkling sequins
handmade
stuff sack included
fresh tangerine
rib-knit
Traditional European
quirky
teapot
avid
mosaics
snappy little colorsplash
spherical
Asian elegance
brave

Here are some combos the kids and I came up with:
Sparkling sequins taped to my globe

fresh tangerine labeling my teapot

snappy little colorsplash sat under my birthday flower arrangement sent to me by a good friend

Asian elegance next to my car keys

avid taped to chop sticks

mosaic light next to my votive candle set

Play around with it. If you or your kids don’t like where one word is, move it. You can also combine words if that adds texture or insight or nerve to your label. You might find that you want to tape words to items that can’t be moved to the kitchen table. Walk around the house and stick words everywhere!

Traditional European might look just right under a certain photograph or painting in your house.

handmade sits next to my computer

brave was taped to my window.

nearly naked was stuck to a print by Matisse.

Feel free to wander through your house taping labels to furniture and brick a brack.

Label things strangely:
rib-knit on a bag of chips

stuff-sack included on a wine glass

Put nouns with verbs (combining word tickets):
car keys jump

chickadee stumbles

Have fun! Post your word sculptures in the comments section of the blog.

To celebrate MLK Jr. Day, I thought I’d post quotes from his speeches and letters. We’re taking the day off to celebrate which means no new blogging from me. I’ll be returning from a trip to Atlanta where I’ll visit the Van Gogh exhibit with some Internet friends this weekend.

Currently I’m studying black theology in my graduate school program and was struck this week by MLK Jr. and his amazing contribution to our country during the 1960s. He was a brilliant orator and has left us with some of the most memorable speeches in our culture—fragments from these letters and speeches continue to challenge us to think and rethink our assumptions even today.

Here are some of his thoughts that might make good copywork this coming week for those who are inspired by them.

–julie (see you Tuesday)

All men are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality.

I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for the law.

In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.

It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can stop him from lynching me, and I think that’s pretty important.

When you are right you cannot be too radical; when you are wrong, you cannot be too conservative.

All progress is precarious, and the solution of one problem brings us face to face with another problem.

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.

These come from a page of Selected Quotations of Dr. Martin Luther King Junior.

When you take your nature walk this week, you might want to try this exercise with your kids. Be sure to print and read these instructions to your kids (or read them enough yourself that you can share them from memory).

Remember an important Brave Writer principle: If your child is resistant, don’t require participation. Simply enjoy the exercise yourself, and with whichever kids are interested. Live the experience in front of your children and make your own enthusiastic discoveries. Then share them, as your own. Eventually, your kids will catch on and want in on the fun. This exercise works best if moms and kids both observe a color on the walk and engage in the freewriting that follows.

Also, there is no rule that says each person must have a different color. In order to avoid fights and competition between children, suggest that each child keep his or her color a secret, only to be revealed after the freewriting is done. Then the color choices will be a surprise!

School is not done to children. The most satisfying learning comes from joyful alertness.

Enjoy your walk!

Color Walk
Put on weather appropriate clothing and get ready for a twenty minute walk in your neighborhood. Each person should choose a color before leaving the house. Any color will do. Even if you choose a color not ordinarily viewed at this time of year, you’ll find that it will work with this exercise.

Open the door and go for a walk. Don’t take anything with you (no pens, notepads, clipboards). No talking. Each person quietly observes the front yards, trees, sky, houses, fire hydrants, stop signs, clouds, flowers, creeks, snow and enjoys his or her train of thought without interruption.

If someone blurts or starts to talk, gently put an arm around that child and squeeze him or her to yourself. You can make a quiet “shhh” sound as a reminder. Kiss the child on the head. Stay clam and gentle.

What to notice
As you walk, notice every time you see your color (or don’t see it). Observe what you see. Really look. If you need to stop and look at something for a little while, do that.

Allow your observations to percolate. Make comparisons. Listen to sounds and notice textures and contrasts. Pay attention to the temperature, the color of the sky, the humidity or rain or fog. How cold is it? How warm? Wind or not? Is the sky blue or is it shades of grey and green? Does the grass look different in the shade compared with the full sun? Look at the shapes tree branchs make when they intersect against the sky.

When you finish your walk, come home, take off coats. Get a drink of water. Then sit at the table and take out a sheet of paper. Without talking, set the timer for 20 minutes and write about your walk. (If you have younger children, 7-10 minutes will be more than adequate).

Here are a few guidelines for writing about your walk that you want to read before you walk or write. Feel free in this freewrite. You don’t need to write about the walk necessarily. In other words, you can write about whatever the walk inspires in you. For instance:

1. Write an interview with your color.
   My oldest son, Noah, picked orange for one of his color walks. We discovered that there is hardly any orange outside. His freewrite evolved into an interview with the color orange wherein we discovered that “orange” is a fairly lonely fellow who feels upstaged by pink and red on a regular basis.
2. Write a story
   Some of my students in the past end up writing a story that uses the colors in some way. One student created a war between his color (green) and the encroaching fall colors (red, gold and yellow). He gave the colors personalities and they even talked!
3. Write an allegory
   Find a metaphor that matches how your color operates in the world around you. I wrote about “greedy green” and how it took over the world in summer.
4. Write about your walk
   You most certainly can chronicle your walk and all the observations you made. You might find that you will naturally expand from the color to a memory or mood or desires and longings. Allow yourself to follow where the color leads. Don’t feel locked into the walk or that it is somehow wrong to just write about what you noticed. Both will work.
5. What to do if you get stuck
   When you find yourself running out of words, write a sentence that starts like this: Green is like…. or Blue reminds me of…

   Do that each time you get stuck and follow where it goes.

   Sometimes when I get stuck, I skip a line and pretend to start over. It frees me from a train of thought that is frustrating. So try that.

   Or you can suddenly address your writing to someone: an imaginary audience or to yourself or to someone you know. Sometimes focusing on a new audience will help you break out some new words and ideas. Always go back to the walk itself and what you saw, heard, felt.

If you feel brave, share your color walk freewrite here.

Julie

Wanted: a few brave writers.