The Meeting of the MInds in Moscow

The leadership team of the Northwest Inland Writing Project gathered in Moscow yesterday. When you have a group of teacher consultants with a passion for writing, literacy, and learning amazing things happen. Plans were made for events this school year, discussions were held on keeping the organization strong, and good food was had by all. Keep tuned in to this blog and FB to keep informed on the activities of NIWP.

Song for Autumn

Inspiration for writing surrounds us as we move from summer into autumn. Our student writers embrace autumn with stories about Halloween, football games, jumping in leaves, frosty evenings, the first hint of snow, and hunting camp. Here is a poem that works perfectly for imaging autumn. It may be a springboard for your students or you!

 

Song for Autumn

In the deep fall
    don't you imagine the leaves think how
comfortable it will be to touch
    the earth instead of the
nothingness of air and the endless
    freshets of wind? And don't you think
the trees themselves, especially those with mossy,
    warm caves, begin to think
of the birds that will come — six, a dozen — to sleep
    inside their bodies? And don't you hear
the goldenrod whispering goodbye,
    the everlasting being crowned with the first
tuffets of snow? The pond
    vanishes, and the white field over which
the fox runs so quickly brings out
    its blue shadows. And the wind pumps its
bellows. And at evening especially,
    the piled firewood shifts a little,
longing to be on its way.
-Mary Oliver

There Is A Place

 This poem works well  as we work at getting students to  write about places they have been and places they wish for.

There Is a Place

There is a place

where the museum houses thousands of paintings

seen nowhere else in the world,

the colors so bright they grab your eyes

and hold you there, looking,

where the library is filled with brand new books

waiting for you to open them first,

to tell stories only you could know,

where fresh cherries have no pits,

where puppies never grow old.

There is such a place,

hidden deep

in me.

- Janet Wong

Routines of Writing and Being Lenient

While settling into the routine of school have you set up routines for personal writing? Here are some suggestions:
1)Make time to write as often as you can. Make it part of your routine.
2)Surround yourself with beautiful writing. Models of good writing can only inspire!
3) Find an inspirational spot to write. I am blessed to have the pond above as a writing spot.
4)Share your writing and your writing process with students and fellow writers. You can learn from each other.
4) Be lenient with yourself. My brother Bill taught the participants in the NIWP writing retreat about leniency. Here is one of his gems of wisdom (and there were many gems):
"To "get lenient" first and foremost defines one's attitude toward oneself as a writer: to be lenient with oneself opens the way to being authentic, writing in one's own voice and style because one is accepting of one's own way of doing things when writing; leniency helps one be more awake, more conscious of the world and one's experience because leniency lightens the pressure to be critical, to judge the world."- Bill Woolum