Lee Report #3

TEXT: After the End

AUTHOR: Barry Lane

This is by far the best piece of resource material I have read while in the class. I wanted to read the text cover to cover---but settled for a few choice chapters. I will buy this text on my return as a resource for the department. Following are summaries of models I found useful:

Seed Sentences: Leads and Research Papers. I am always looking for better, more efficient and interesting ways to teach the skill of the thesis statement. Much to often, this skill appears to elude students I have in senior English. I have found myself snatching the paper out of a student's hand and writing the darn thing myself?after working and working with that student and getting unacceptable results. I understand this action is a professional no-no?but one must accept when they are beaten and simply move on to the next step. This section offered some great questioning techniques for producing good thesis statements?and an offering of good examples. There is also a useful six-point process called "finding the heart of research" that offers wonderful group activities for developing thesis statements. Hurrah!

More Than Wallpaper: A room with a view. This particular model deals with encouraging kids to add more detail to essays and their writing in general. Kids are asked to imagine a room they know well, eyes closed. Open eyes and quickly write down five details they remember, then they and partner take turns asking each other questions about the details to make them more specific?i.e., My mother was sitting in a chair--- Vs---- My mother sitting in a chair knitting a pink sweater for my Aunt Margaret's latest brat. I am always happy to have the good examples. I am spurned into remembering how important the questioning process is to writing good details. We do not ask enough questions of each other period. I think we feel somehow it is a violation of someone's privacy or we appear too forward. Questions are often flattering.

Creating a Language of Craft: Re-entering a draft. Now I know this little model sounds almost trite, but I find the simple skill of paragraphing escapes students more often than I would like. Freshman and sophomores will often write an entire essay without paragraph breaks even after being cautioned at the onset of the assignment. Seniors do the same thing, simply not as often. Lane suggests offering kids options to the formulaic, topic sentence/supporting ideas. He claims there are some excellent ways to write excellent transitions and topic sentences before kids even start indenting. Kids don't have to learn how to write paragraphs, but how to identify ones they have already written. He offers some simple guidelines to help kids move past the formula. A paragraph is:

When one thing shift to another thing?a shift in thought, a movement in a story a change in point of view, or speak.

A new idea or a shift in direction.

- When a new person is speaking.

- Like a giant period at the end of a clump of sentences.

- Where the writer wants to create space in the reader's mind--

experiment and try to make paragraphs where you want the

reader to pause.

I could blather on about the text?but instead will purchase my own and put it to use the classroom. What an excellent tool.