To thrive as a teacher at any level for 15+ years, one has to create assignments that not only challenge learners to show what they know while they learn more in the process of showing their knowing, but to also design assignments that one can learn from as teacher, be surprised by. One of those assignments for me is the end of the semester/end of the year writing booklet, or at least students make it so.
On the surface, it's pretty clear-cut. I ask: one, from any class or writing outside the strictures of school, select X number of pieces of writing you have done this semester/year that you feel best represent you as a writer; two, create an introduction for each piece that teases potential readers. These introductions can be written, can include computer graphics, drawings, collages, photographs, videos, selections of music, actions the reader needs to complete before/during reading... whatever you can do to get readers ready to read; three, as this booklet is a publication, it should be attractively designed, include an attention-getting cover design, be bound in some permanent fashion, and meticulously proofread. What students do within these guidelines continues to delight. With scant knowledge of the rich history of artists' books (I show samples, primarily, of previous classwork but also talk about artists' books I've seen/read/experienced in the art world), these young writers create books to open eyes.
Mattie S. chose a picnic theme for her end of the year book, Swallowing My Emotion. But this was no ordinary picnic, no easy chewing, swallowing, and digesting. Mattie chose the most edgy writing from her notebook and from class essays and research. The first photo below shows the packed picnic basket. The second shows the basket's contents spread out, each small box containing the writing skewered by knives, forks, spoons, and a corkscrew. This is a selection of writing made even more forceful through its presentation.
For two years, Pam Freeman has been working on a fantasy novel. (She's now five chapters or about 60 pages into it.) For her last booklet, she chose to introduce her pieces through a mobile (see photo below). Each hanging, spinnable, spaceable object corresponds to a piece in the bound book that accompanied the mobile, several of which she conceived in her sculpture class. Hanging in the front of the classroom for about two weeks, this was a collection of writing, a presentation of writing, that garnered respectful attention, both for its ambition and for its meticulous execution).
In a future entry, I'd like to highlight some of the audio that I received this spring as part of this assignment, starting with poet Sasha reading the poems in her book (though right now I think she has the book and cd). Hers are poems that make your hairs (if you've still got 'em) stand on end.
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